Adgressi Draconis
by The Potless Stoner
Summary: Azula, now in control of her powers and her life, faces new problems when the Fire Lord drags her and her best friend turned wouldbe consort, Ty Lee, on a 'vacation'. How does relaxation spell war? sequeal to Draconigena
1. Hello Mother, Hello Father

.

So, due to my half satisfactory ending for Draco 1, I'm writing a sequel to answer the 'what happens now?'

On with the show!

Disclaimer: …

The low voice that crept through his cell door was not his son's demanding information on his estranged mother. It wasn't any of the guards he knew. This man's voice was the low hiss of a viper-lion, with all the grease and slime of a vulture-rat.

"They say you're daughter has made a beast of herself," the man spoke to his silent back, "A true dragon," when he received no response he continued, "A fool of a soldier thought he could control her. She tore him apart as you can imagine," he couldn't stop the prideful smirk from crossing his face, his dragon daughter could not be controlled by some half wit, "You though. With you it was hard to tell if she was your daughter or your dog," he finally turned his eyes to the man outside his cage. He wasn't a terribly large man, or a very impressive one. Clearly an earth nationer, his robes and mint green eyes proved it as did the way he wore his hair in a long braid down his back, "you could say the word and she'd tear down friends and family to please you," two men dressed in the uniform he remembered as the Dai Li entered behind the man speaking to him, one holding a heavy brass ring of keys, "I believe we have a mutual interest Fire Lord Ozai. I have a proposition for you."

"I'm listening."

-D.-

The hawk's squawking broke the stale silence of the Fire Lord's study. Worn gold eyes rose to the red plumed bird, and it crowed again before flitting from the window ledge to his desk and turned so its message carrier was towards him. The black ribbon that peaked out from the casings top made him groan. Black ribbons meant important matters. Important matters typically meant there was bloodshed or death or rebellion, trouble in general was summed up in two words, 'black ribbon'. Already up to his ears in cleaning up the chaos of the still messy matters of the Hundred Years War, and matters following the Nothus rebellion and Azula's reintegration, Zuko was sure he'd die of a heart attack before he even reached twenty.

Dejectedly he opened the message carrier and removed the letter. Tired eyes brightened and sleep slowed mind went reeling as he read the message, twice over to be sure before quickly writing his reply and slipping it into the birds carrier to be taken back. As the bird took to flight the Fire Lord made his way out.

A servant passing by his study stopped and bowed.

"Fetch the Avatar and friends for me please, and have them come to the western war room."

-D.-

How she'd got roped into training the idiot before her she wasn't sure. No, she was completely sure on the how, Ty Lee had helped the gaang with that. How she'd stuck with it and not killed him yet was what she truly wondered. Before her the world's biggest idiot (and she was more than ready and willing to argue that fact) sat legs crossed and meditating. The avatar fidgeted, unable to hold still. The supposed 'world's greatest bender' couldn't hold still for even a few hours. Wasn't that supposed to be one of the qualifications to being a master air bender? Being able to meditate for hours at a time, sometimes days.

A growl escaped between barred teeth. She had better things to do then babysit. As the Fire Lord's Commanding Officer of the newly formed Terrorist Prevention and Reaction Unit, she had a hundred things better to do then this. As a fully functioning and competent human being she had a million better things to do.

A smirk crossed her mouth when the boy jumped and froze when he heard her growl.

The quick steps of a servant approaching them caused her to pause in reprimanding the male, and instead look up to meet the young girl walking towards them.

"The Fire Lord has requested the Avatar in the western war room, M'lady," the young girl said, bowing low to the fire bender.

Boy perked up at the prospect of getting out of their own voluntary training. _Idiot,_ she thought, "you know you could leave whenever you wanted, I'm not forcing you to stay."

He wasn't listening as he bolted out of the court yard and inside to the war room.

_Idiot…_ She left in the opposite direction, going to her own more private training grounds where she wouldn't be bothered.

-D.-

The western war room wasn't nearly the impressive grand hall the central war room was. The western war room was smaller, strictly for the use of the Fire Lord and his most trusted generals with only a small round table that held a map of the four nations. The former gaang, now ambassadors and leaders of their respective nations, gathered around the table waiting for the Fire Lord to explain his gathering them there.

"So, Sparky, what'd you call us all here for? I got important things to do," Toph said from her place, feet up on the table, chair leaned back, arms behind her head.

"This," Zuko replied, laying out the letter he'd just received, "it's a letter from one of my search parties."

"Letter, as in paper and reading? I'm out," the earth bender made to stand, but was held back by a hand on her shoulder, Katara throwing her a disapproving glance, though she couldn't see it.

Mai rolled her eyes, before settling them on the letter her husband had laid out, "Fire Lord Zuko, we, the Sixty First Recovery Team, are reporting to inform you that while stationed at Delasis Island's eastern province we have…," her words drifted as she read over the next lines, delicate black brows raised, "they've found her."

Zuko nodded, a giddy grin growing across his face, "They've found her, and I've already given them orders to be ready for us to arrive and met there in two days, we leave tomorrow."

"'We'?" came a joint question from the others.

The young Fire Lord frowned, "'We', yes. I'd like you all to come."

"You realize you'd be leaving Azula alone in the palace then, correct?" Mai asked, eyeing the fire bender skeptically.

Zuko's excitement dimmed slightly, his smile turning sheepish, "actually, Azula and Ty Lee will be coming with us."

Toph cracked a grin, while Sokka out right laughed, "You're kidding right, Sparky?"

Zuko shook his head, becoming serious, "no, I'm not. Azula will be coming too. It'll be good for them to reconcile. Remember I wasn't the only one left behind."

They all stared at him for a long time, the excitement from the letter dimmed to a seriousness that rarely fell on the group.

"She won't go along with this, you know that," Katara said, concern for her friend in deep blue eyes.

Zuko grimaced at that, "I know…"

-D.-

Muscles relaxed, and mind focused. She inhaled, her core temperture sky rocketed; exhaled, and the heat spread around the court yard. Long had she surpassed using candles to meditate; now she used her own internal heat. Inhale, exhale. Lost in the rhythm of her own breathing she almost missed the excited shout of her name, and barely had time to catch the pink bundle that threw itself into her lap.

"Azula! We're going on a vacation," the acrobat informed, arms around the fire bender's neck.

The statement caught her off guard for a split second, "'we're' doing what?"

Ty Lee nodded enthusiastically, "A vacation! We've been stuck at the palace for so long," the acrobat groaned for effect.

"Six months is not that long, Ty," the dragon replied, the memories of past failed vacations ran through her head.

"The others are going, and they invited us," the acrobat pouted.

The fire bender had to resist the strong urge to lean forward and nip the other girl's protruding lower lip, "They invited you more likely."

"No! They invited both of us!" Ty Lee protested, before returning to her pout, "please? It'll be fun…"

Azula could imagine the conversation that had gone on only moments before knowing for a fact that the aura reader on her lap had been the one to 'invite' her along, "Unlike, Zuzu, I still have real work to do fixing his mess."

"It's a nonnegotiable vacation, Azula," a new voice came from the edge of training area.

Azula glared up, at her brother, "Unlike you, _Fire Lord_, I still have a job to do, one I can't just push off on someone else."

Zuko's glare met her own. She'd been home six months and though they had never come to blows yet, horns were locked at nearly every turn. Azula knew better then to outright challenge her brother, as it was only with his efforts and his friends efforts that she was allowed her freedom once more, limited as it was.

"Two weeks away won't kill you," he replied, "and even so, Ty is coming with us."

The acrobat's enthusiastic nod pulled Azula's gaze back to her, for a moment. With annoying abundance the others played the 'chink' in her armor. It was said that dragon's had a soft spot in their scales, just over their heart. She had once almost torn the water boy's arm off after she'd heard the low, 'whitch' of the moron mimicking a whip in reference to Ty and her. Her brother was one of the biggest players of this trait, and had only survived on her most extreme efforts at self control and Ty Lee's ability to chi block.

She released a frustrated growl, smoke rising with it. The aura reader buried her face in the fire bender's neck, "please, come with me Azula?" she could hear the pout in the girl's voice and the wetness in her eyes.

Her teeth ground. _Don't look_ repeated in her head.

"You're coming. Two weeks won't kill you, be ready to leave tomorrow morning. That is an order, _Commander_," Zuko turned his back on her before he could see the glare burning holes into his back.

-D.-

One hundred years of military superiority had been put into the ship they now sailed upon. The Fire Nation's Imperial Fleet Runner had been a gift to Azula from her father when she'd turned twelve, when her flames had turned blue. It was a thing of true beauty, which had been turned into a jungle gym as Ty Lee bounced from railing to railing, and even up the siding of the upper royal cabins and down the side ladders nearly to the water.

Azula shook her head, watching the display from an observation deck chair. Part of her, the part steeped in military discipline and slightly worried that the acrobat would fall, demanded that she tell the girl to stop. The other part of her, that held a bit more confidence in the aura reader's abilities and that had always let the girl have a much longer leash then others, told her not to worry, and enjoy the show the acrobat was putting on.

It would be their last day on the ship, set to land at noon at the eastern ports of Delasis Island, why in Agni's name her brother wished to vacation there, she hadn't the faintest idea. The island was mostly cliff, with a small secluded bay at the island's eastern side that served as the only way on or off the island. Ringed by sheer cliff face with the added bonus of a lion-shark play ground in the surrounding waters, the island had been the original base for Boiling Rock when Azulon had been in power but had been nixed for unknown reasons shortly after Ozai had taken power.

Begrudgingly she had to admit, even if it was only the second day away from the palace she felt far calmer, relaxed. Even if they were going to a hell hole of a place for vacation, perhaps she would have a good time, if only because of the girl somersaulting over her head.

"We'll be landing soon, Lady Ty Lee, please come down from there!" The ship's captain called.

The acrobat flew down from the roof of the second tier upper courters and landed beside Azula, "fine," she said, with a fake exasperated sigh, flopping into the fire bender's lap.

"Exquisite performance," the dragon whispered, as the captain left them to give the crew orders. The aura reader giggled lightly, arms around the other girl's neck.

From their seats they watched the others prepare to disembark. Immediately Azula's eyes narrowed in suspicion. She'd known something was wrong with the 'vacation'. The location aside, there was little reason to do something so idiotic. Even her brother was not impulsive enough to up and decide to go running off to an island once considered for a prison ground. The timing was more than 'a little' in opportune, as the rest of the world and most of the Fire Nation's newer official still distrusted her and she knew her brother was still dealing with the terms of her freedom and the back lash of making her a commanding officer, far from an ideal time to call a hiatus to negotiations.

Those were things she knew from the beginning of the idiotic plan, but now something new had raised her suspicions. Her brother's mood had significantly dropped. Beginning with near Ty Lee levels of excitement but now he was clearly concerned by something, his nerves obvious in his face. He, Mai and the water bender were gathered talking in low voices, each with their own mix of apprehension and other emotions on their faces. Every now and again one of them would throw a look her way before turning back to speak again.

"We're here!" her reverie was broken by the excited call from the girl in her lap.

She looked up and saw the enormous ring of sheer rock wall looming over them. The excited acrobat hopped up to her feet, pulling the fire bender with her. She rolled her eyes at the girl's antics, but followed as they made their way to leave. It hit her then, as they began disembarking from the ship. A scent, one like orchids and fire lilies after a rain, hit her nose and sent ice down her spine in an instant, though she couldn't place it. She knew the others didn't smell it, her over active senses the only reason she'd even picked it up. Around her waist she could feel the dull buzz of the belt waking, just slightly to her reaction. Something most definitely was not right.

On the shore a team of ten guards in full dress, as they would be if escorting a member of the royal family were assembled. Their commander stepped out, and bowed to Zuko, speaking in a low voice so that only the Fire Lord could hear him, before her turned back to his team and ordered them to step away from the person they were escorting.

The belt immediately began to burn around her waist when her golden eyes, met an older, more bronzed pair, her growl made lower by the oncoming change, "Mother."


	2. Rising Tides

.

So, I had my stepmom read ch1, and her reaction, "I can see this 'Ty Lee' as a Pikachu… Are they going to then cliffs of insanity [princess bride]? ... She's got the belt of Deltora!" -.-;

Thank you to all the returning readers and any new ones! Updates may take longer since I am trying to honor a promise I made to myself to write about 5 pages per chapter, instead of my usual 3.

On with the show!

Disclaimer: …

The arms that had been around her neck in relaxed comfort became restraining. When something struck her temper wrong, usually Ty Lee's tightened embrace reminded her to be calm, but this time, there was no calming her.

"Azula," the acrobat whispered, as she felt the heat rising, radiating off the dragon's skin.

Muscles bunched, flexing and unflexing, unsure of what she wanted to do. Her body shook as the belt awoke to her rising temper. The surprised, pained yelp from the girl embracing and restraining her gave her split second pause, but even split second was long enough for Ty Lee to press her thumb over a point in the fire bender's neck and shut the heat off completely.

Azula went limp in the acrobat's arms. Her brother stood wide eyed, staring at his seething sister. The others stood tense and ready for a fight until they realized Ty Lee was the only thing keeping Azula from collapsing and there was no more threat of suddenly having to fight a dragon.

"Azula!" Zuko scolded, meeting her glare, with his own.

Anger slowing the click of pieces, the reason for their 'vacation' came clear to her. Her glare moved from the woman, who had changed very little since she'd last seen her, with the exception of more peppering in her hair and lines framing her eyes and mouth, to the Fire Lord. A low snarl scratched her throat.

"Azula, calm down-," Ty Lee whispered, trying to calm the now paralyzed girl.

"Like hell!" her glare met Zuko's, "you dragged me here for that _bitch_?"

"Azula!" the reprimand came from both her brother and mother. Her glare shifted to the woman who had sounded half way pleading. Ursa had stepped forward. Under normal circumstances, she might have been able to keep her annoyance to a step back or a darker glare, but now, was far from normal circumstance. Even without her chi feeding it the belt still affected her mentally. The small step her mother had taken broke her temper further.

"Don't you dare," the words promised death far better than any draconic snarl she could have given. Surprised and disappointed the older woman took a step back again.

Ty Lee shifted, supporting her princess with one arm, while her other hand undid the gold fire emblem buckle that had replaced the rusted iron buckle of the dragon scale belt, "Azula, please calm down," She'd moved between Azula and the others, carefully slipping the belt from the fire bender's waist, arms replacing draconic hide.

Unable to hold herself up, the princess was unable to retaliate when her belt was taken. Once locked into the acrobat's embrace, and physically incapable of looking away from anything but the cool gray eyes now meeting her own gaze. Her teeth ground, as she forced her glare to meet the glossy orbs that blocked off the rest of the world. Sluggishly her temper died down from wild fire, but did not fully extinguish, "I refuse to have anything to do with _her_," she made sure her words were loud enough for the others to hear.

Ty Lee looked over her shoulder to the Fire Lord, who had been about to object to Azula's refusal, the acrobat's words stopped him, "that's ok, right, Zuko?"

There was an odd pleading look in Ty Lee's eyes, clearly asking him to let the princess have her way. He opened his mouth to protest, but gray eyes turned from mere pleading to near puppy begging, and only dry air escaped. He took a moment to collect himself, before responding, "We'll be staying with, _mother_," he made a point of saying the word, "and the boat is leaving and set to return as requested in two weeks. She'll have to tolerate until then."

A rough snarl escaped between Azula's bared teeth.

-D.-

Twenty minutes she sat paralyzed, suffering in the company of people she cared less about then the wooden floor on which she sat. Her teeth ground as she listened to the group talk and laugh in the large sitting room, the house her mother lived in had clearly been built to suit her status despite her banishment. She relaxed a little at the thought, as soon as she was able to move again she could leave the house, as soon as she could leave she could avoid the group before her.

Out of annoyed habit she willed her hand up so she could look over her nails, her hand obeyed. As soon as she saw this she stood up, using the wall to support her rise, to be sure she was fully back in control of her body, "I'm going outside," she snapped, as the other's looked up to see her moving. Before any of them could say anything she was out the door.

"Azula?"

In her haste to be relived of the company of seven people she would have thoroughly enjoyed seeing fall from the cliffs surrounding them, she'd forgotten the one person there she didn't want to kill on the island, "just going for a walk Ty."

The acrobat nodded, "I'll come with you," the acrobat smiled and looped her arm with the fire bender's.

The dragon shook her head, "I need to be alone, Ty."

The acrobat frowned, "but, 'Zula…" worry in moon gray eyes, she wrapped her arms around the fire benders neck.

"I need to be alone, Ty," she repeated, more authority in her voice, enough to stop any argument but not enough to chase the girl away.

The pink clothed girl knew there would be no arguing with the dragon, so with a sigh she stood up on her tip toes and kissed the other girl's cheek before moving to go back inside.

"I'll be at the cliffs, don't tell any of them that," the fire bender said over her shoulder before they made their ways in separate directions.

Azula headed straight for the cliffs, determined to get as far as physically possible from the others. Luckily for her, past residents of the island had shared similar dislike for the place and had taken an enjoyment out of using the cliff's more sinister uses, and had carved out a path winding up the inner wall. The trail cut the time it would have taken her by half, her temper, still present had waned. With a low sigh she moved close enough to the edge to feel what little sea spray could reach her.

"Running away? So like your mother."

Goose bumps ran over her back hearing the voice. _Not possible..._ She turned slowly, trying hard to maintain the calm she'd gained, and met the hard yellow gaze of her father. _Not possible_ she repeated. It was impossible for him to be there, even for her escape would have been near unfeasible, him without bending it was completely impossible. She put a hand to her forehead; it had been months since she'd hallucinated, _Agni, could this be worse timing to relapse?_ Despite herself she growled back, "I'm nothing like that _woman_."

"No? You right, you're worse than her. You run from your problems, when you could easily be rid of them, and why? Because of a bitch who doesn't even love you," disgust was written in his eyes as he glared her down.

"Don't call her that," her anger was back as she glared down the illusion, not caring she was arguing with thin air, "and she does love me."

"If she loved you why would she let you go?" he shot back, when she didn't reply he continued, "She's down there with your mother, and her friends, while you're up here. She pretends to love you, and still chooses them over you."

"I wanted to be alone. She didn't 'choose' them, I told her to stay," her blood was boiling, she cursed that she'd left without taking her belt from Ty Lee.

"Why? Why make someone you supposedly love stay with people you hate?" when she didn't answer he continued, "Is it because you don't trust her?"

"That's absurd! Of course I trust her," her stomach flipped at the cord he'd struck.

His eyes narrowed, and she bit her tongue. If this had been anyone else they would have only been able to hear the anger that had transcended their entire conversation, but this was her father, the man who had taught her both fire bending and lying, he could hear the cord in her voice, "she's struck you down, twice now, to save them. People she knows you hate, but you suffer their company, for her. Now she's down there, with them and your mother. You and I both know the truth."

She's growling now, a true low rumble from somewhere in her chest, cursing that she hadn't retrieved her belt from Ty Lee before she'd left, "Ty Lee has a ridiculous obsession with life, she doesn't care more about them then she does me, she simply doesn't want me to kill them."

"Really now? Tell me, what did she do to help you, when they caged you and left you to rot, hm? You were nothing but a zoo animal then, and now you a tame house pet," silence followed his words.

It was something she'd pushed to the back of her head until he'd pulled it free, as her mother's departure had been until she'd been betrayed. She had justified it simply with Ty Lee's dislike for bloodshed; though she despised the 'gaang' as they called themselves, they had become Ty Lee's friends. She had pushed the acrobat's transgressions at Boiling Rock behind her after being pardoned, but the memory didn't leave. Built upon the tendrils of betrayal other minor discretions seeded their way in to offer more proof. Convincing her to aid in furthering the Avatar's fire bending, helping to rope her into their current situation, paralyzing her moments ago, taking her belt, and those were only events that had occurred in the last month.

The moment of silence brought a deadly smirk to his mouth, he knew she was torn now, "she'll choose them over you every time, just like your mother."

The crash of a large wave behind her that sent spray high over the cliff and against her back made her jump, so wrapped in the conversation she'd been that she'd forgotten the world around her. She turned to see the clouds rumbling miles away from the island, pounding the sea into choppy waves. The storm would hit the island in a few days time by the looks of it. When she looked back her father was gone.

-D.-

The smirk never left his face as he made his way back to the secluded bay the Dai Li had made camp. The meeting had gone far better then he'd expected he'd have to the idiot acrobat and friends for fraying his daughter's strings, before he killed them of course.

"Where is she? I thought you were bringing her back with you," the man, he'd learned was Long Feng, glared at him the instant he'd entered camp again.

Clearly he'd learned nothing from his experience with Azula, "Don't worry, with any luck she'll tear them apart without needing to be told, and if not she'll come running to us."

Narrowed green eyes watched him for a moment before the man moved away.

_Idiot, never turn you back on someone you've given good reason to kill you._


	3. Stormy Morning

.

Looking back over this and Draco, and still can't believe this came out of a shitty amv I thought of for a few songs on my Pump Up list.

On with the show!

Disclaimer: …

As she'd guessed the storm came within a few days after they had arrived, rolling in at night and continuing into the day, the storm's force locking everyone inside. For five days she'd managed little to no contact with the rest of the group, other than Ty, who made a point of keeping her from brooding. Her hallucinations had been pushed to the back of her head, kept from the others.

The storm raging outside refused to allow her to continue her avoidance. She'd left Ty Lee in bed, the acrobat yet to wake even with the thunder roaring around the island, and had made for breakfast, planning on returning later to retrieve her belt and before going out to train. She ate slower than normal willing the rain to stop, hating to train in the wet and cold. As she finished she could hear the rain beginning to let up. As the rain began to die she heard others begin rising and she cursed not simply training in the rain. She made to leave the dining room as quickly as possible, but was stopped by a voice.

"Azula?" smoke escaped in her breath as she heard her name.

"I'm going out to train," she replied, not facing her mother, instead turning toward the hall that lead to the room she'd been given, going to retrieve her belt.

Her mother's steps followed her, "I want to talk."

"Feel free, but talking to yourself is a one way ticket to an asylum," the fire bender snapped back, quickening her pace.

"You would know all about that, so I've heard," ice down her back, like most of her mother's words had always done.

Flames licked her lips as she growled back, but refused to dignify the woman a response. Her mother would give up and leave her alone if it turned into a one sided conversation, and if she didn't she would leave her alone when she went to train. No one was foolhardy enough to disturb her training. As quietly as she could she slipped the door open and made her way through the room she and Ty shared, retrieving her belt from the dresser that stood opposite the bed Ty Lee was still asleep in. She paused for a split second before moving to the window and shutting the heavy curtains, so when or if the sun rose that day, it wouldn't wake the acrobat.

When she made her way back to the door she was met by the sight of her mother still watching her, silently observing her actions. She met the older bronze gaze with all the hostility she'd met it with the first time she'd stepped onto the island, daring the woman to say a word.

For a split second, Azula believed her hopes that her mother stay silent, as she closed the door and brushed past the older woman. Of course, the woman wouldn't be her mother if she didn't criticize her, it would have been too much to ask that she stay quiet or at most simply nod in acknowledgement. The woman stood before the door for a moment longer before speaking, "you two were always, _too_ close."

Ursa and the rest of the house's occupants were lucky Azula had the forethought not to put her belt on immediately. The disappointment and ever so subtle distain in her mother's voice, grated on the fire bender's nerves. Acid in her voice she snapped back over her shoulder, "Funny, I always thought the same about you and Zuzu," she never stopped her way outside and into the courtyard she'd made her training ground. Slipping on the belt, her energy spiked with her temper, and she pushed into her training trying hard not to attack the woman who stayed in the covered walk that led into the rest of the house from the courtyard. The rain by now was gone leaving only the silver gray sky as testament.

She'd hoped the weather and her statement would get her some peace and quiet, but no such thing came. Instead, "Azula, don't speak that way, it's disgraceful and vulgar. Really, I raised you better than that."

She teeth snapped and she stopped the movements she began, "_You_? YOU raised me? My nurse maids knew me better than you ever did, or ever will."

Her mother was silent after the statement. Azula took it to mean she was done bothering her and went back to training, having to fight the urge to throw an 'accidental' fire ball at the woman still watching her.

"You were… a difficult child to deal with, Azula," the fire bender ignored the statement and kept into the movements, attacking invisible foes, and waiting for the woman to grow tired of her unresponsiveness or her temper and leave, but her mother remained, "you always wanted to do things you shouldn't have," her teeth ground as she pushed away memories of being told she was bad for burning a doll she'd never wanted, or sneaking into the soldiers barracks to talk to them about tactics, "I thought sending you to that all girls school would help, but instead you just came back with that girl," her mother never had liked Ty Lee, she'd tolerated her because the young acrobat was the only person who could keep Azula's destructiveness in check, "I could never understand you."

_Don't answer her. Don't_ but her own response was spit back before she could stop it, "of course, it's _my_ fault you never understood your own daughter. It's _my_ fault you abandoned me for Zuzu," her pause was short, only long enough to snap the retort before she was back into her training.

Her mother was quiet for a moment, "you never exactly made it easy. Always off with your father, that man…," she shook her head, "that man was a monster, I'm almost glad he left your brother alone."

The air stopped, heavy with sudden heat venting off the fire bender, sarcasm boiled in her reply, "yes, thank Agni little Zuzu was safe from such a horror, because where would we be if he wasn't?" sensitive ears perked, barely recognizing the others waking, disturbed by her shout, but she didn't care, "no, let the younger daughter deal with the 'monster' leave her to herself, and if she's not a prodigy who cares at least _Zuko_ is safe."

The woman was silent, meeting her daughter's fierce glaze with a hurt one.

When there was no response Azula's anger burned more words from her mouth, "did you ever think of that, hm? What if I didn't do all the things I shouldn't have? Father, wouldn't have given a damn about me, what then? I wouldn't have had a mother to run to!" her ears flicked as she heard footsteps approaching them, but her anger was too strong to care much about who it was coming to investigate. The belt around her waist twisted, tightening with the heat around her, seeing red didn't cover it.

"No, I didn't think of it, your father made sure you were the prodigy he'd always wanted," her mother replied, her hurt gaze turning to an angry one.

The fire bender's breathing was becoming ragged, the change danced beneath her skin, the uncomfortable burn that went straight to her bones, her next growl was near thunderous, "yes, he did. He forced me to be a prodigy, and you sat back and watched. You called me a monster then. Monster," she could feel her bones beginning to groan, begging for the change, "You've no idea," the pain scorched her nerves, pulsed in her boiling blood. She was turning.

-D.-

The young acrobat woke to the sound of Azula's yelling. She rolled in the warm, soft blankets, willing herself back to sleep, but more yelling ensured her rise. Sleep slowing her movements she slipped out of bed. Once on her feet she, still in sleep robe and loose sleeping pants, she trudged out of the darkened room and out, following the commotion towards Azula's training ground.

The air coming in through the open sliding doors was moist, thick with the water from the morning rain, but as she came closer the air boiled, practically smoking with the energy the fire bender let off. The heat brought out Ty Lee's cautious side, as she approached. Azula stood outside, in a standoff with her mother, who stood in the covered walk that opened to the courtyard.

"Monster," Azula's growl reverberated through the fire bender's chest. From her place she could see the princess's muscles flexing, stressing her clothes as her body demanded to change. _This is not going to end well_ she thought, before she could move between the fire royalty, Azula spoke again, "You've no idea," the words drown into a draconic snarl.

Her once tired muscles jumped into action before she had time to think about what she was doing.

-D.-

Her claws crushed the covered walk, but it lacked the satisfying crunch of bone, and squish of blood and meat beneath her talons. A growl rolled between her teeth as huge slitted gold eyes searched the courtyard for the woman whose blood she wanted to spill. She found her mother on the grass beside her, Ty Lee between them.

_No_ her mind reeled, _no, no, no! Don't prove him right!_ Her claws dug into the ground and she bared her teeth, lowering her head so she was eye level with the acrobat. Her steel gold eyes met resolved gray. _She'll choose them over you every time. Don't prove him right_, what would have been a hostile snarl died into a whine, her ears flicking back, _no… She'll choose them over you_.

"Azula, calm down, she didn't mean whatever it was…" the acrobat tried, reaching out a hand and putting it to Azula's snout.

_Every time_ the soft hand on her scales froze her blood. Had it been anyone else of the group she could have understood a bit of ignorance when it came to her and her mother, but this was Ty. This was the girl who'd been at her side since they'd met, who'd less than four hours before had shared her bed. Ty Lee knew the relationship between mother and daughter, from first hand viewing. She knew, and still she acted as if the woman never meant her trespasses. The dragon pulled away, standing up on hind legs and staring down at the two.

The ache in her chest amplified her anger and she couldn't stop the roar from escaping her throat, more pain than fury. She willed her claws to crash back to earth, to tear the pair apart, but her body refused, and instead of her claws meeting flesh her wings beat, and she was off the ground. When she met earth again it was the cool stone plateau of the cliffs.

Her senses still trying to understand what had happened she didn't hear the man approaching behind her.

-D.-

"What… Was that Azula?" Ursa had finally risen from the place Ty Lee had pushed her to get her out of the way of Azula's claws.

The acrobat nodded, watching the dragon land far above them, disappearing above the cliff face, "what happened to upset her?" the aura reader knew she'd be going up the cliffs this time, regardless of what she may say as a human, she needed someone now.

"Let's call it family issues," the woman replied, still staring at the places in the earth where Azula's claws had dug trenches into the ground and to the now crushed walkway.

The others began making their own ways out the roars and smashed wood drawing their attention.

"Wha' happened?" asked a still groggy Sokka.

Ursa seemed to be drawn from the broken wood and trenches to the group now, "when were you going to tell me, my daughter could do _that_?"

The group was silent for a long time. Ty Lee's eyes still up at the cliffs. She could see Azula's tail swishing at the edge, indicating where she'd lain down, and her remaining irritableness, "I'll go calm her down and try and get her back. One of you guys explain," with that she too was gone.


	4. Him or Her?

.

Sorry to have been away for so long, my computer has a virus that blocks Wi-Fi access and won't let me update my virus wear -.-; , fml…

On with the show!

Disclaimer: …

"She chose your mother, didn't she? She chose them over you again," her huge golden eyes slipped to the man who approached her. He was just as he'd always been. Fine pressed fire nation uniform, though it was not quite his fit, his beard and hair were still well kempt, the only thing missing was his crown, but he was otherwise unchanged.

She had tried to will into herself the hatred the others had for the man, but it never quite reached her fully. He was her father, the one person who'd always chosen her. His strict disciplines aside, his training and forced perfection aside, he had always chosen her. His expectations clear at all times, unlike her mother who watched with constant disappointment , but never explained, or Ty Lee who seemed transparent to her yet always proved her heart was elsewhere. The man before her never hid anything. Although she knew he'd never give her the love of a father, he did give the conditional approval of one. So long as she had his approval, he would always choose her.

And she'd called him a monster. The thought left a stone in her belly. She turned away from him again, unable to meet his gaze.

"I didn't believe it when I was told. Centuries of fire bending masters couldn't control it," the pride in his voice had her watching him from the corner of her eye. He looked over the leviathan of blue before him, "I shouldn't be surprised of course."

She swears there is pride in his voice, and for a moment she's taken back to the first time she'd ever thrown a fire ball, nearly charring Zuko's shirt in the process. Her mother had reacted with a swift swat to her bottom and a scolding, but her father had stood back with the same prideful smirk as he wore now, and had put her to training within an hour of the incident. The first minor show of approval she'd received from ether parent. The familiarity of it gave her some slight comfort. Her response to his words was a low bellow. If she turned back she could have spoken with him, but she refused to so shame herself further before the man who'd raised her. She'd already shown her cowardice by running away and her lack of control by turning and attacking, she would not turn human and further disgrace herself by appearing before him naked, hallucination or otherwise.

She shifted from lying, sprawled across the stone to sitting back on her haunches before him. It felt odd to be looking down at the man who had towered over her through her childhood.

He reached out when she'd settled herself before him, his hand on her foreleg barely able to reach her elbow.

"Azula?"

Her head snapped up, eyes caught on the girl who stood where the trail up the cliffs ended. The thunder gray eyes were not on her but the man before her.

-D.-

She'd expected the angry dragon to be alone, the way she preferred to be when she was agitated. _Agitated… That isn't even close_ the acrobat let out a sigh. Had she known the reason they'd come she would have been against it. She would be one of the first to agree the two fire nation royals needed to come to terms with one another, but not like this. Forcing them into close proximity was like forcing two angry dogs into one kennel, one would undoubtedly end up dead. She was more than relieved that the princess had taken to avoiding the others all together, finding her own way of dealing, tolerance, however volatile, was tolerance at least.

She of course had kept the buffer zone between the fire bender and the rest of the group, while in turn trying to keep Azula from brooding. A brooding Azula was a scheming Azula, and a scheming Azula meant body bags and bloodshed. To her credit she felt she'd been doing a good job of it, until that morning. She'd felt the fire bender wake up, as she almost always did. Usually she was able to keep the other girl in bed another hour or so, giving her more time to sleep, and giving the princess time to mentally prepare for the rest of the day without her actually getting up and having to confront any of the others straight off of waking up. This time though she could hear the storm outside, no one would be up at this hour, or no one but Azula would be. She felt groggily certain that the fire bender wouldn't get into any trouble if allowed to get up while the storm raged, and when she rolled over, curling into Azula's spot on the bed, and felt the extra warmth left by the other girl, her decision was made for another few hours of comfortable sleep.

If only she'd gotten up with the fire bender or kept her in bed a little while longer… _No use trying to change the past,_ the acrobat thought, as she neared the cliff tops. Then she heard a voice. A familiar one, but not her fire bender's. She couldn't place a name to it, but the sound made her uneasy almost immediately. She heard the dragon's low bellow in response and heard the scraping of scale and claw on stone, but not in attack, the sound of movement was slow, as if Azula were calmer now. This brought a frown to the girl's face, as she wondered at who could have been with the dragon and calmed her.

Cautiously she finished her climb, and gasped at the sight, "Azula," the fire bender's name slipped passed her lips in surprise. Azula's huge gold eyes looked to her, but she was far to shell shocked by the sight of the once great phoenix king who stood before the dragon.

-D.-

His teeth ground as he turned to see the girl approaching. Of course she would follow Azula. He'd been almost surprised when he'd met his daughter alone the first time. If she pulled the right strings, intentionally or not, the dragon would be back under the spell of those huge gray eyes. The prodigy's fondness for the girl cost her more than any miscalculation could ever have, and now the girl was costing him. He could see his daughter looking between them, before moving towards the acrobat. _Losing her with a look, pitiful…_

He flicked his fingers, silently signaling the hidden earth benders.

-D.-

Her mind was reeling. Her father was really there, the surprise on Ty Lee's face was enough proof to say she wasn't the only one seeing him, but how it was possible was far from her mind. The first and for most thought, _what are you going to do Ty?_ The acrobat shifts and finally meets her eyes. A new thought replaced the first, _what am I going to do?_ Imprison the man again? Choose them over him? _No…Not them, choose her over him?_ There was no way she'd do something for the gaang, if Ty Lee wasn't backing it… The man who raised her, or the girl who loved her?

She watched the acrobat's legs twitch, as if to move back to the path again, _no, Ty don't go!_ She moved to stop the girl from returning the way she'd come, but they were both floorer. Up from between her forelegs a pillar of stone had jumped, slamming into her chest hard enough to throw her dragon-self over completely onto her back. Around one of Ty Lee's ankles was an all too familiar stone gauntlet.

Before the green uniforms could show themselves she knew show was there. _Dai Li._


	5. Falling

.

Sorry, for the wait. My computer was in the shop (me=death to electronics) and I don't like asking to borrow computer's from people for the extended periods it may take to write my longer chapters.

I'm SO SORRY! (For many things involving this chapter and you'll see why, but mostly for how long this took me) Please, please, please, for the love of the Gods/Goddess, have mercy!

On with the show!

Disclaimer: …

There was silence for a long time after they had told Ursa the story of Nothus's short lived rebellion and Azula's new powers.

After a moment of processing it Ursa spoke, "And she can do this? Turn into a beast whenever she pleases?"

"Only with the belt," Mai replied. The task of storytelling had fallen to her as the others didn't seem to know were too start.

"And you let her keep it?" the woman turned to her son, unsettled by the lack of concern the group before her seemed to have.

Zuko looked guiltily away from his mother, "well… So far she's kept herself in check, and whenever we come close to a problem Ty Lee is there to defuse it…"

"Plus," Toph put in, "she's shut down more rebellions by showing up with fangs and claws than any negotiations we've ever tried."

A few grudging nods followed her words.

Zuko cleared his throat, "I'll have a word with her about this once Ty has calmed her down."

There was some slight relief in Ursa's eyes but not much, she sighed, "to think I don't just have to worry about her burning down my house, now she can tear it down without a thought."

As if to prove her statement a crash elsewhere in the huge house made them all jump and run to the room the noise came from. The ceiling had caved in from the force of a man being thrown down from the cliffs. His uniform indicated his alliance to the Dai Li and the ragged parallel lines that crossed his chest indicated clearly how he'd been thrown through the ceiling. All eyes moved up to the hole, through it they could see a thrashing blue tail and flying earth.

-D.-

Ozai barely had time to dodge the stream of blue flames escaping the dragon's mouth. The beast's head had been knocked to the side by a sudden column of earth from the earth bender who would have been the target. _Idiots…_ the earth benders were spending entirely too much time trying to restrain and pacify the dragon. If they left her to him, he could do so without a fight. The earth benders fighting should have been concerning themselves with getting rid of the acrobat who tore her loyalties. His daughter would be distraught but would listen to him if the girl was gone.

He made his way through the chaos created by beast and bender. Despite his own bending lost, the movements remained fresh in his mind, a great benefit to him in the field of earth and blue fire, as he looked for the girl in question, if the earth benders wouldn't get her out of the way he would and then would come back to deal with his daughter later. The ex-fire lord caught sight of the blur of pink dealing paralyzing blows to a few off guard men, trying to get closer to the dragon herself.

Before he could move towards her a powerful wing threw one of the offending earth benders from the dragon's back and into him. He tossed the man off his back yanking one of the bender's arms behind him to keep the man restrained. It was Long Feng.

"Call your men off my daughter, there should only be enough to distract her if that," he growled, still holding down the earth bender.

The earth bender growled back, "you don't command me or my men. Remember who freed you."

"I may not command your men, but she is far from your control," He moved off the earth bender just in time for a huge blue tail to slam into the ground into the man as the dragon reared onto its hind-legs and roared in frustration. He heard the crack of ribs as he made towards the pink girl, catching her off guard and throwing her in to the larger fray near the dragon.

-D.-

Up the cliffs the gang raced. They found the plateau over run with Dai Li agents, trying and failing to restrain Azula. Near the larger fight Ty Lee faced off against a few earth benders, who'd broken away from the dragon to face her, and a man in the black and burgundy of the Fire Nation. The man in red gave them pause, sending ice through their veins on sight.

-D.-

Her back claws dug into the ground while her fore claws tore and tossed her attackers. Flames danced out of her jaws engulfing a few unlucky foes. Those that were thrown over the cliffs had attracted lion-sharks, and the water below frothed with their feasting and the blood of the luckless fools thrown over.

Her hind claws sank suddenly lower into the ground and to free them she gave a strong flap of her wings, lifting her from the ground and freeing her back legs, before she landed. As her weight hit the ground again she heard the crack of earth beneath her and when she looked down, saw cracks racing along the earth.

_The ground's going to give way_, she thought and as if to confirm her thoughts the ground began to sink, falling into the water below. Before she could think about where and _who_ she was moving toward, she was bolting forward away from the falling earth.

-D.-

She hadn't expected the punch from Ozai. She'd been too concerned with disabling the bender before her to notice the man in red throwing a punch to her ribs. The hit floored her for a moment and within that split second she was pulled into a one-on-one fight with the ex-fire lord. He was stronger and faster than most of the benders she was accustomed to fighting.

He fought like Azula, or maybe Azula fought like he did. She'd been able to take out the fire princess by anticipation and making the first move, but when Azula took the offensive when they spared, the fights were near impossible. Against the ex-fire lord the same could be said. For her part Ty Lee was forced to dodge and block, unable to get in a shot that would disable the man before her.

The surprised roar caught both their attentions and they both looked to were the dragon was only to see the ground cracking beneath their feet. The acrobat caught her senses quicker than the ex-fire bender. She jumped and flipped, landing on the ex-fire lord's shoulders in a hand stand and hit a point that disabled his arms, before flipping off of him and onto safe ground. Her momentum pushed him forward onto the ground that was sinking and directly under the dragon's claws. In seconds the ground, the man, and the beast were gone from sight, and sent crashing into the water.

-D.-

Dragons are not graceful fallers. Azula learned this lesson well as she fell from the cliffs. The drop was too short for her to spread her wings properly, while her serpentine body was impossible to maneuver in such a way that she could catch herself on the wall, no matter how she twisted trying to regain her bearings. Combined with the rocks that fell around her and bombarded her, it was impossible for her to stop her plunge into the frothing, bloody waters bellow.

An over compensative twist, meant to force her at least to where she would hit the water on her stomach, had her rolling all the way over several times, before leaving her with her back to the water. That was when she saw him, his chest and back torn open. She'd barely recognized the crunch of bones beneath her talons when she'd been running, nor did she feel the squish of blood and meat, but the marks were unmistakably hers. Her heart stopped for a beat as the realization of what she'd done ran through her mind, and it was in that moment the water rushed up to meet her back.

-D.-

From up on the wall, Ty Lee looked down over the newly created ledge. The gaang had come up some time in all the chaos and were taking care of the remaining Dai Li, leaving her to look for the dragon. She saw both the beast and the man hit the water, and knew there was no chance for Ozai, the water already frothy with blood from others who'd been thrown over the cliff faces previously. She knew that lion-sharks couldn't do much damage to the dragon, but swimming as a beast had never been an easy feat, and she prayed Azula got her bearings before too long under water. She held her breath as she watched the water return to the bloody froth it had been before the leviathan reptile fell in, but was relieved when she saw it quickly swell and boil as the dragon broke the surface again.

As Azula rose to the sky, huge wings beating heavily, it hit her. Something is wrong. Wrong beyond the fight the dragon had had with her mother, beyond Ozai's return, beyond the surprise assault. As Azula's wings beat out a quickened rhythm and she rises faster into the sky, Ty Lee realized she's not going to land.

"Azula!" She calls as the dragon sails past her and over the island, "Azula, wait!" she ran, following below the dragon, calling to her trying to get her to stop. She chased the dragon to the other edge of the cliff, but the beast did not stop, and in barely a few seconds, the glittering of blue scales dissolved into the distance.

-D.-

_He's dead_ she thinks, those two words repeating in her head. _He's dead, and I killed him_ she feels too much in that moment to pay attention, or care what she's doing or where she's going. She had just killed the man who'd raise her, who she'd followed without question for fourteen years of her life. That fact echoes over and over again in her mind. Panic, shock, anger, she isn't sure which was most prevalent.

_He's dead and I killed him._

Her wings beat faster and faster, even as she sees the sky darkening and the moon begin its rise. For six months she hasn't thought of the past, the war. Six months the hyperactive acrobat has kept her mind from the darkness of what life was before, but now… Words she had forgotten for the six months of peace she'd had after returning home echo into her head, like dropping a heavy stone into water.

_She's right. I'm a monster._

She flew until her wings refused to carry her any further. When she landed she threw herself into a gallop, and when her legs refused to continue, she collapsed, feeling cold stone stairs beneath her, before sleep over took her.


	6. Choices

.

Theme songs for this fic: "Live Again" by Course of Nature, "Do You Call My Name" By Ra, and "The Devil's Own" by Five Finger Death Punch, "Forsaken" by Within Temptation.

I'd also like to apologize for the wait. A note this is the longest chapter I've written for anything 13 pages, longer than most of my class papers.

On with the show!

Disclaimer: …

All the reports read the same. _The prison was completely destroyed. _Each sounded like a repeat of what had become of the asylum. Over and over in his head he tried to work out what could have happened but it all lead him back to the same place, and made his stomach roll. The knock at his study door broke him from his thoughts.

"Sire," The soldier bowed at the door and waited to be addressed.

Stifling a yawn from the exhausting toll the week had taken on him Zuko nodded to the soldier, "News?"

The man began reading off his report, "None of the Dai Li will speak." This didn't surprise him in the slightest; the world's greatest secret police force wouldn't break to the new 'humane' interrogation techniques that had been agreed upon at the Four Nation's Summit.

"But," the soldier continued, "The man identified as Long Feng is awake now. The healers tending him have deemed his broken ribs severe but not life threatening. He's being cleared for interrogation as we speak, sire."

-D.-

The room they were in was empty except for the bed the green clothed man was chained down to. As a precaution the room was several stories up, with wooden floors and walls, while anything that might be used in retaliation had been removed, including, it seemed, the air itself as it hung thick and unmoving between the two benders.

The silence was broken by the earth nationer, "to what do I owe the pleasure of being questioned by the Fire Lord himself?" his voice was pained, but still held the notes of cold pride and confidence.

"My father was on those cliffs during that fight. I want to know why and how he got there," Zuko replied ignoring the other man's comments.

Long Feng's mint green eyes narrowed, instead of answering the question he responded with his own, "Is this how you treat a witness? With chains and imprisonment? Why should I cooperate after such treatment?"

The Fire Lord was taken aback for a moment, "Witness? What are you talking about?"

"Wit-ness," he replied, splitting up the word as if he was talking to a child, "It means a person who is invited to tell about a crime he saw. Surely the Fire Lord understands the concept."

"I know what witness means," the fire bender responded, aggravation in his voice, "And if you want me to see you as one you'd better answer my question."

"Is this how the Fire Nation runs a case? By threats and bullying?"

Zuko let out a breath, smoke flowing with it, "I could have you and your men executed for a high security prison break, and assault on the royal family."

"Were we not Earth Kingdom citizens, you very well might."

"I've already contacted the Earth King, he's given me free rein to punish you as I see fit for your crimes."

"For now, perhaps. But how long until he realizes that you are using this pretense as an excuse to question me? Even the King is not so great a fool as to let you have free access to the Kingdom's deepest secrets. He will demand that you release me, and when he does, you shall have cause to regret how you've treated me."

Another irritated growl escaped the fire bender, "You're avoiding questions that could set you and your men free."

"Free? Do you take me for that much a fool?"

"If you really are just a witness, why not? Right now you're still seen as the mastermind behind a failed assassination attempt."

"Assassination? What would I gain from that? Your reign has ended the war that cost me my position, my men, and my pride."

"I don't know. I'm trying to figure that out."

"Think your highness. How would I have had anything to do with the breakout?"

"I don't know," Zuko growled, "But you were there as was my father. That's what I want to know. Why were you there? Why was he?"

"Well, you could say I was there because he was there."

His eyes narrowed in suspicion. "Explain."

"My agents were informed of the prison break. Ozai is far too dangerous of a man to be let loose, so we sought to apprehend him. Alas, we failed to account for the Princess'... irrational behavior. Then you and your friend the Avatar arrived, and chose to attack rather than learn what was happening... and you know the rest."

"If what you say is true," Zuko's stomach began it's uneasy rolling again, "then who was it that broke him out in the first place?"

"Who else but his most loyal servant," when he saw the blood draining from the Fire Lord's face he knew the young fire bender had bought his lie before he'd even finished, "Princess Azula."

-D.-

_She can't see anything but black around her, but she can certainly hear. The dull roar of voices surrounds her. Her mother whispering words of thinly veiled disgust and disappointment, her father's angry shouts of betrayal, Ty Lee's attempts to comfort and calm her. All of them, mixed with hundreds of others, some that she can place, some that she doesn't remember hearing until now. The more she tries to listen and catch the words of one, the louder the others grow, and soon she's dizzy from trying to listen to them all. _

_Then she's falling, and one by one the voices fade as she falls until there's finally silence as she hits bottom. There's no pain when her descent ends, only a mild tingle, and her body refuses to move as she wants it to. She's stuck laying on an endless expanse of blackness until a pair of hands pulls her up so that she's kneeling. Before her stand her mother and father, neither of them speaking, and when she looks to see who sat her up she sees Ty Lee, fixing iron shackles to her wrists, chaining her to the ground._

_Immediately she begins struggling with the bonds until Ty Lee giggles, "Don't do that, 'Zula, you'll hurt yourself," before leaning forward and kissing her. Despite her own wish to continue fighting her restraints her body refuses to move after the kiss and Ty Lee moves away to join Ozai and Ursa._

"_Do something right for once, and don't fight this, dear," her mother says, and she feels her stomach drop as overly warm breath bathes her back._

"_I can't believe you'd turn on me like that. You know you deserve this," her father's voice is next, as around her she sees fangs dripping with saliva and feels the breath of the fire breathing beast against her back._

_The acrobat smiles at her, "It'll be ok, 'Zula, you trust me, don't you?" The dragon's jaws close around her._

Azula jumped awake and before she had time to register her surroundings, she fell to the floor from the bed she'd been in. Her head collided with the stone floor, and she curled up on the floor holding her now pounding skull, as spots danced in her eyes.

"She's awake!"

Before her vision cleared she found herself being hauled into a sitting position. The sudden movement turned her stomach. The woman who'd helped her sit up must have seen the color in her face drop and moved just before Azula found herself falling forward onto all fours, stomach heaving until bile splattered the floor and her nausea passed. She sat back slowly this time, leaning back against the bed behind her, chest heaving after the nausea spell.

The room was small. The walls and floor were stone with an odd weaved grass roof. The bed was the only furniture in the room, a combination of animal furs and straw. The woman beside her wore a white linen skirt and top, the latter of which only just covered her breast. The dragon assumed she wore the same from the slightly uncomfortable scratchiness of the material, though it wasn't as uncomfortable as iron shackles or scales. She brought a hand to her stomach, realizing the belt was no longer in its place.

Before she could put voice to the question she was hauled to her feet roughly by two shirtless men who'd joined them before she could begin asking where she was. The two backed off after pulling her to her feet and stood watching her in contempt. The woman who'd originally come in moved towards the door where another man stood.

Despite the pounding in her head years of training steeled her back, and annoyance found her eyes and the men around her.

The man who stood in the doorway was far more decorated than the others around her. He was a round man, and despite the ridiculous plumage on his head he was still shorter than her. Hard brown eyes matched hers, tinged red from the face paint he wore.

She gathered from his appearance that he was the leader, and made to question him when he spoke, "What is a member of the royal family doing here wearing the skin of a slaughtered dragon?"

Her teeth bared immediately at his tone. Despite lack of knowledge as to where she was she snapped back, "Why I'm here is my own business, and seeing as you already know my position you should also know the penalty for this treatment."

"You have no authority here," the man replied, taking a step towards her trying to intimidate her.

"Oh, I don't?" it was a dangerous low growl, as she stepped forward to match him. He shifted uncomfortably, clearly not expecting the challenge and only then noticing their difference in stature. The two men at her sides shifted their stances, apprehensively. She felt the internal tremors begin after her step forward; she'd moved too fast for her still pounding head, though she didn't show it.

"Not with the blood of a dragon on your hands," he growled back, "you're nothing but a murderer here."

One brow rose, even as her stomach tightened at the accusation the cliff top battle replaying in her head, "If that's true, then why didn't you kill me while I slept?"

The man before her clenched and unclenched his jaw, "It's not our place to decide your fate it's the masters, they're the ones you've offended."

Her eyes narrowed at this, about to ask who 'the masters' were that warranted respect or apology from her but before the words left her mouth his eyes flickered to the two men at her sides. The spinning of her head slowed her reaction time enough for them to grab her and force her arms behind her back.

They dragged her out, despite the threats and struggle she put up, though her pounding head made it difficult to think and fight. Her feet refused to move back under her, and each time they did manage to the men dragging her would speed up and she would lose her footing once more.

They pulled her up a long set of stone stairs before dropping her unceremoniously to the ground tossing a thick, scaled black object to the ground beside her, the belt.

Only when her head stopped pounding did she realize they'd left her alone. She pushed herself up, slowly enough not to aggravate her head. She was on a huge circular plateau at the top of a long set of stairs. Two stone bridges led from the plateau to two tall spires that rose from crashing waves, caves opening up at the ends of each bridge. Immediately she became wary of the two caves. Heightened senses picked up the long, heavy breathing of twin leviathans, and the beating of huge hearts.

The hidden beasts grumbled as she picked up the smooth, worn scales. Without thinking she replaced the black scaled belt around her waist, some slight comfort coming to her when she felt the heat of the black scales as it twisted itself to fit her waist properly. A surprised jolt ran down her back when the low grumbling became voices, one a male's low and rough, the other female calm and cool, both held something in them that reminded her of the crackle of a well fed fire.

"_She is young to have such a gift, no?"_ the female voice asked.

She saw something flicker in one of the caves and eyes moved to it, just catching the glimmer of scales and golden eyes.

"_Indeed. Why have they brought her to us?"_ the male replied. She looked the other way, the male's voice coming from her left, the female from her right.

There was an odd sort of amused purr before the female voice spoke again, _"I believe she is listening, Ran."_

Azula knew it was directed at her and she straightened up slightly, "I am and I don't enjoying speaking to someone I can't see," the indirect order evident.

There was humor in the male's voice, _"She wishes to see us, Shaw."_

"_Such arrogance for one so young,"_ came the female's reply, _"but I suppose we should oblige a daughter of Agni."_

A tremor ran down her back as she heard the movement of the huge beasts. The belt around her waist began moving, breathing with her as her unease rose. She looked both ways catching sight of huge amber eyes one either side of her, before the pair stepped out of their respective caves. She had once considered herself a large dragon, but even she was dwarfed by the two that flanked her now. To her right the female dragon, huge shimmering red orange in the sun light, shifted and laid down, spanning the length of the bridge, tail flicking as it hung down over one side. The male a magnificent blue, lighter than her, sat to her left head to one side observing her, his tail curled up at his side.

She stayed impassive and proud, despite the uncomfortable heat ran through her blood and the unbearable itch that ran beneath her skin to her bones, instinct telling her to change.

"_What is your name, young one?" _the red dragon asked, head resting on huge fore-claws.

Golden eyes shrouded in bronzed scales met her evenly. While no one had ever accused her of lacking pride, she was not one to lack respect for those who deserved it and while she was not to be intimidated by the beasts, she knew from the steady gaze they were worth her respect, if only slightly. "Azula," she finally announced, "Crown Princess of the Fire Nation."

Both huge heads moved, nodding as if confirming her words. Huge, golden jaws moved, _"I am Shaw and my brother, Ran," _the female dragon nodded towards her counterpart. _"It is interesting that one of the royal family awakened so great a power at such a young age."_

She shifted straighter for a moment about to reply but was interrupted by the male dragon, _"she may have awakened it but she has not mastered it,"_ there was an added edge to his voice, almost one of disgust, that made her hair stand up, and awoke the uncomfortable itch and burn of an imminent change.

"_Perhaps, but that is no reason to disdain of her. Mastery comes of time and pain as we both know,"_ a cord was struck by the words. She made to respond again but was drown by the other dragon's arguments.

"_Mastery of such a gift as this can be the difference of life or death."_ Memories of the fall the day before ran through her mind as he said those words. _"It's the very reason only true masters were blessed with change!"_

The dragon's eyes coolly settled on the blue beast across from her, over the girl between them, _"All fire bending mastery can mean life or death, Ran. It is the very reason why we still teach humans our secrets."_

She felt a growl roll in her throat at being ignored, it seemed to bring both of them back to her presence. The blue dragon glared at her, and she glared back meeting his gaze, somehow his words seemed to be directed at both her and his sister, _"she already has blood on her hands from carelessness, you and I both know that."_

His head lowered so they were eye level, and she felt a shudder run down her back and heat swell in the belt, her instincts telling her to change, but she was determined to keep her control, as if to prove to herself in control. "I don't know what you're talking about. I'm not a careless killer. Losing control would be disgraceful."

"_And yet I can smell the blood of unintentional kills on your hands,"_ the snarl ended with the snap of fangs inches from her face.

She scoffed at the attempt at intimidation, though the words struck a low blow, "if you haven't already noticed, you don't exactly scare me."

"_Do not mind Ran, he is not happy with Agni's choice to bless one of the royal family with such strength. But do not try and contest him. There is a reason the belt has not fully accepted you, and it is clear you have not mastered it,"_ Though she didn't turn her back on the blue beast, not trusting him, she turned to look at Shaw with narrowed eyes. There was a slight, ruefully sympathetic look on the beast's face. She looked away indignantly, not wanting to accept the dragon's words, _"But, as my brother and I have offered to all of your kind that come here and prove their worth, we will extend our teachings to you. It s your choice whether to accept them or not, but know, though your instincts have saved the things you hold dear to you in the past, they may not always serve you so well,"_ she narrowed her eyes, looking back at the beast once more, wondering just how much the dragons could read from her.

The rust colored leviathan shifted rising and stretching her huge body, _"for now we will leave you to think and rest."_

-D.-

For what seemed like the millionth time that day, hour even, Ty Lee looked out to the sky. They'd returned to the palace as quickly as possible after the attack, Ursa returning with them. At first the others had reassured her that Azula was just going to fly back once she'd blown off steam. It was three days off of being two weeks, and Azula had not returned.

Out of boredom and a lack of anything better to do she had been wondering the palace until a servant had come and asked her to join the others for lunch in one of the open dining halls. She had smiled and agreed followed the servant girl to the open court yard. At its center was a huge table that could very well have seated twenty, roofed over to provide shade. The gaang was already seated, except Zuko who'd seemed to lock himself away in his study since they'd arrived back.

"Really?" it was Katara's surprised voice she heard as she approached all of them wrapped up in a story Ursa had been telling.

The older woman smiled, "oh yes, both of them loved swimming. I swear I thought they might have been water benders at first," She laughed behind her hand, "Whenever we went to Ember Island they'd go straight to the beach and swim 'til they were too tired to move."

"What are we talking about?" The acrobat asked as she took her seat at the table, ever one to join in the conversation.

Ursa's laugh went around the table quickly, and Aang was the first to answer, "Ursa was telling us about how much Zuko and Azula usto like swimming."

"Oh, yeah!" her own smile grew, "the last time Azula went swimming was when her fire turned blue."

"Really?" Sokka asked.

"I always wondered why that was," Katara put in, with Aang making a noise of agreement.

"She never did explain what happened in the time we were all separated," Mai's voice was last to join, quick silver eyes meeting Ty's stormy grey. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Ursa's less than thrilled look, clearly not wanting to hear about her daughter's prestigious abilities and how she'd furthered her without even trying on a leisurely swim.

The acrobat's brows drew down and her lower lip poked out in a pout as she remembered what had turned Azula's flames blue, "Her dad was going somewhere on some Fire Lord something or other, and she and Zuko were going with and she decided to take me…

_The acrobat looked down in awe at the bright sea foam that rushed by the boat. Huge elephant-Kio and otter-dolphins raced alongside the huge Imperial Fleet Runner. Azula had bragged to her about the advancements of the ship, despite neither of them really caring what any of the details really meant. For both the twelve year olds the best part of the huge ship was the shiny golden detailing. _

_It had been a surprise to her when Azula had asked if she'd wanted to join her and her brother on the trip their father was taking them on. Ozai hadn't let up on his daughter's training, leaving Zuko to his own devices and leaving her to wait out full days of training with nothing to do until dinner when Azula was finally free to rest. Now was no different, so she sat sidelined, alternating between watching the waves fly by against the ship's hull, and watching the princess train._

_She looked back at the princess when she heard the fire bender hiss in pain. _

"_Again!" The Fire Lord pushed the young away by her shaking outstretched fist that had just landed an imperfect blow. The acrobat could see by the way her fist was held, looser then it should have been, and by its bright red, slightly swelled back that something was broken. Azula would never say a word about it. Ty Lee made to mention it, but a quick look from Azula the pleaded with her to be silent kept her from saying anything. _

_So she watched as Azula repeated the movements, her strike weakened by the pain in her hand._

"_Are you trying to disappoint me?"Ozai seethed, glaring at his daughter and pushing her away once more. This time the young fire bender lost her balance and fell, catching herself with the broken hand. Her jaw clenched in pain and pushed herself up, a tremor running up her arm from her broken hand. "Well?"_

"_No, Father, of course not." Azula's eyes remained set forward, not recognizing what was in front of her just fighting of pain._

"_Then why," he growled taking a step towards his daughter, his stance ridged, "do you insist on failing me?" _

_Before the princess had time to respond, the acrobat stepped forward, unable to watch anymore, "Her hand's broken, sir," she ducked her head quickly to avoid the glare she received from both royals. _

_She looked up through her lashes to see Ozai looking back and forth between the acrobat and fire bender, "Is that why you're being so incompetent, Azula?"_

"_No, Father. It doesn't hurt that badly," She lied before trying to flex her fist to prove it._

_Her father's eyes narrowed and he looked back at Ty Lee who was frowning to the other girl, "Is it because you're being lazy, because I've allowed you to bring your friend. "He moved from where he was before Azula to walking towards the acrobat who stood by the railing. The young pink clad girl shifted, knowing the Fire Lord was someone to be feared._

"_No, Father, of course not! Ty Lee has watched us train, hundreds of times," she yelled, trying to get her father's attention once more, so as to spare her friend from the man's wrath. "She's never affected my performance before, she doesn't now."_

"_Perhaps, but just to be sure," the hand that grabbed her collar surprised her but not as much as when she was suddenly thrown into the air. She twisted just in time to see Azula running to the edge of the ship._

_Her back hit the water first and she felt something crack, and was unable to move as bubbles rushed up around her and the fish she'd been watching from the deck scattered in different directions. Above her she could see the sun as on bright white spot in shrouding navy blue darkness._

_The sudden shadow and splash above her blurred the white spot and she was pulled into Azula, pain shooting through her back but she was unable to move to react. They were both sinking and she could see the cogs working behind Azula's golden eyes, brow furrowed._

_She could see fear, and pain shoot threw the golden orbs as the fire bender move unintentionally hitting her broken hand, the surprise and pain causing her to gasp and loss the breath she'd been holding and her instincts took over. Without thinking she kicked up and there was a burst of flames beneath them her arms tightening around the acrobat and they were pushed to the surface by the blue flames._

_They gasped taking deep, greedy breaths once they reached the surface. Above them Ozai stared over the railing, Zuko and a few crew man beside him. _

"_Are you ok?" Azula asked gulping and kicking hard to keep them both a float._

"_No," she managed but couldn't move to shake her head._

_This immediately tipped the princess off that something was majorly wrong, since the acrobat always spoke with both her voice and body. She gave another strong kick and they were both in the air, a burst of blue flames carrying them up well above the ship's railing, but neither of them were prepared for landing._

_Azula hit the deck on her back, still holding tight to Ty Lee to keep the acrobat from hitting the deck and further injuring herself._

_Before Ty Lee was fully aware of what was going on Azula was up and shouting for a healer and the crew man were rushing around her. One man lifted her in such a way a jolt ran through her back, and she cried out in pain. Azula was immediately yelling at the man to be more careful, and he shifted to carry her more gently to the lower decks where the ship's infirmary._

_Azula joined her an hour after the healer deemed that she may have fractured a vertebra but not severely enough for the paralysis to be permanent (which he had made sure to repeat upon her immediate panic). The princess's hand was tapped and casted, but she stood straight and proud a smirk across her lips when she told Ty Lee her father had given her the ship as a reward for her new abilities. _

The table was silent as Ty Lee finished the story, all eyes on her.

Toph, ever the tension breaker, was first to speak, "I thought fire benders couldn't bend under water."

"That's what Zuko said," Aang blinked, still in shock, "do you think she'd teach me that?" He looked at her hopefully.

She shrugged; "if she comes back maybe…" her eyes flickered to the sky again.

"Yes, she's a wonderful bender. She learns a fantastic new power saving someone's life, and uses it to end others," it was Ursa voice broke through the excited murmurs.

The table went silent. Tension grew between the older woman and Ty Lee. She'd never understood the relationship between mother and daughter, but it never stopped her from trying to put the fire bender in a positive light to the older princess. "But that was the old her. Since she came back she's helped save people's lives, ended rebellions. She's paid for what she did in the past." She looked around the table, looking at the faces of those who she come to befriend and who at the very least had grown to accept Azula. They nodded grudging agreements.

It was then Zuko finally appeared. His face ghost white, even his scar seemed to pale, his eyes cloudy as if he was looking at something not there. He took his seat beside Mai blindly eyes unfocused on the table.

"What did he tell you?" Mai asked, worry in her eyes though her face didn't show it. She put a hand on his back.

He licked his lips, "He said they were tracking my father after his escape, planning on recapturing him and the person who aided his escape." He swallowed, his shaken appearance never leaving him, "I had my suspicions and they were right. Azula helped my father escape."

-D. - **(A/N should I just leave it there? You know my love of cliff hangers. Am I that mean? No… maybe…)**

The news had caused an up roar at the table. A chorus of 'what's had followed his announcement followed by Sokka's shout of, "Of course she'd never change," and Katara agreement. Toph had been on the absent fire bender's side, replying that Long Feng was just as much a liar as Azula had been and that she didn't trust a word the snake said. Mai had gone silent and Zuko's shell shock had yet to wear off. Ursa had nothing but venom for her husband and daughter. Meanwhile Aang was trying to calm the now outraged table.

Ty Lee had stood up and fled the table. As she left she heard the crack of wood and dining wear from a steel hand slamming the table in anger.

She'd ended up on the roof somehow, and how long she sat there she didn't know. The dull roar of earth moving didn't reach her ears, until the squeak of unoiled hinges and cool steel met her shoulder.

"Toph!" she jumped in surprise.

A crooked grin crossed the earth bender's face, "the one and only." The grin disappeared for a moment growing serious, "you ok?"

The acrobat looked out towards the horizon, the golden orange of set sun contrasting with the midnight blue of night sky, reminding her of her absent fire bender, "They don't really believe him do they?"

"I don't," the younger girl replied, "Sokka and Katara are convinced he's telling the truth," it was rare for Toph to use names not nicknames, it meant she was completely serious, "Aang doesn't know who to believe."

She nodded.

There was silence for a moment before the earth bender cleared her throat, "Zuko is feeling pressure from the council. It's added fuel to the anti-beasty fires, and we're not sure how the Earth King will react." She shifted, pulling her hand from Ty's shoulder to and shifting to sit with her arms on her knees, staring out at the same sunset but not seeing anything. "He's setting up a team to go catch her and bring her back you know."

"Really?" the way the earth bender said it made her feel as if there was something darker to it.

Toph nodded, "They'll bring her back in chains."

She'd been expecting it but it still felt like a blow to the gut.

"But they won't be ready to leave until tomorrow, and they don't know which way she flew," The earth bender was still staring blankly off, as if disinterested in what she was saying, "but somebody who knew where she went and could I dunno jump on a giant flying bison and start after her tonight," Toph had a contemplative look, "I bet they'd be able to catch up to her at least and tell her what's going on. Then maybe she'd make a plan and get out of this mess," she nodded, "that sounds like Azula. But," she shrugged, "that'd only if somebody can get Appa out of the stables with no one noticing, maybe at night while everyone's asleep."

Ty Lee stared at the earth bender, processing what she'd just been told. There was a surreal quality to what Toph had just said, as if it had all been imagined. The pat on her shoulder and the smirk on the earth bender's face said otherwise. She stood patting Ty's back again, "you might want to hit the hay," there was a slight short laugh, "g'night."

-D.-

The prodigy sat up at the top steps leading to the dragons' lairs. The night breeze hit her back, carrying with it the drops of the ocean's cool water that evaporated the instant they touched her. The village was asleep before her.

After meeting with the dragons and returning unscathed, she'd belittled the men who'd dragged her there. They'd demanded to know what it was that the dragons' had told her, and what she'd done to avoid being eaten. She'd promptly transformed, roared once and turned back ending all questions and leaving the people gaping.

The rest of the day she'd been left in relative peace, offered new clothes after destroying those she'd been in before she'd transformed, and food at meals.

All through the day the dragons' words ran through her mind, reminding her of all the things she'd done since she was free of the asylum. Nothus had only been the first, she'd intended to kill him yes, but waking up weeks later to find out she'd killed him in her stampede to save Ty Lee, had been less than satisfying. Then came those idiot rebels after him, those who had refused her negotiations and become hostile towards her. More often than not she could kill them quickly and easily, but others became all out chaos. Chaos was her ally in those cases but blindly causing destruction was far from proof of her abilities to keep control.

These slips in control paled in comparison of course to the previous day's lack of judgment. Not only had she shown her mother her lack of control, her father now served as a lion-shark's dinner because of it. A painful jolt went through her chest.

'_Though your instincts have saved the things you hold dear to you in the past, they may not always serve you so well,' _the words ran through her mind. She remembered thinking of tearing the acrobat apart after she'd stepped between the two royal women, and worse pain jumped through her chest at ever thinking such harm on the girl.

She heard the low bellow of the dragon's sighing and turning, she thought in sleep, until she heard Shaw's voice, _"Have you made up your mind, Azula?"_

She nodded, without looking to the beast, "I've decided to take up your offer. Begin in the morning?"

When she did look over her shoulder to the red dragon there seemed to be a smile on the large snout, _"As you wish, young dragon."_

-D.-

She smiled petting the huge nose before her and offering the fruit she'd smuggled out of the kitchens, much to the happy bellows of the bison before her, "Come on we're gonna go find Azula," she smiled again, grabbing his reins and walking him out of the huge stables. The wind shifted around them and the dark skies pricked with stars seemed larger than she'd first thought. It scared her to think she had to track the dragon on her own after almost two weeks head start.

Her grip tightened on the rough rope in her hands. Unlike the soldiers that would be sent to find Azula, she knew which direction she'd gone, that was something at the very least. With that slight bit of hope she secured her clothes and the things she'd gathered in the short amount of time as provisions to the bison's saddle, before moving to the beasts head and grabbing his reins once more, shifting to get comfortable. "Yip, yip!"


	7. Madness and Control

.

So it's 2 days after the 1 year anniversary of me starting Draco, thereby starting all this madness. HappyLate-Birthday Draconigena! (P.S. I felt like I should have been playing "Eye of the Tiger" for half of this chapter)

On with the show!

Disclaimer: …

"Appa's gone!"

It was the shout Zuko woke to the morning after he'd announced he'd be sending a search team after Azula.

"Appa's gone!" the shout was further down, as if Aang was running down the hall trying to wake everyone.

Mai was already up and opening the door, rubbing her eyes in annoyance at having been woken.

Outside the door Toph could be heard, "Can it, Twinkle Toes. I think they can hear you in Ba Sing Se," sleep still in her voice.

"Appa is gone, Toph! This is an emergency!" Aang cried out again.

"How did you manage to lose a several ton sky-bison for a second time?"Mai asked, in her sleep robe. By now all the group had gathered in the hall.

Aang and Katara both shot her a glare, "I don't know!" Aang shouted, "I went to feed him this morning he wasn't there!" Panic was bright in his eyes.

"Maybe he just got out and went flying or something," Sokka said, rubbing his eyes, still tired. "I'm sure if we just checked back there now he'd be there."

Despite Aang's arguments that he knew the bison would not be back the gaang made their way to the stables where Appa had been housed, and found it empty as he'd told them it would be.

A nearby stable hand, who'd been asleep at his post, woke at the commotion.

Zuko began questioning him before he'd even tried to bow, "what happened? Where's Appa?"

The man blinked groggily, and pointed off in the sky, "The Lady Ty Lee toke him out last night. She said she'd be right back," he waved his pointing hand. "She went that way. Thought she'd be back by now…" he scratched his head.

There was silence for a moment as it set in.

Zuko straightened himself shock passing as his mind raced, "I'll send the search party after her, with any luck she's heading straight for Azula."

-D.-

The sun was to her back as she climbed the stairs to the dragons' lair. She'd woken as she had every morning with the sun and readied immediately to meet the beasts. Both were already prepared for her, stretched out across the stone bridges that led into their respective caves.

"_Good morning, young dragon," _Shaw nodded towards her as she reached the huge center platform, _"I hope you are well rested."_

Ran shifted as if to get comfortable, _"Indeed. You'll need all the energy you can get."_

"I've trained on less sleep for longer hours," she replied, rolling her shoulders, feeling the heat and energy flowing through her as the sun warmed her back.

She saw a flicker of humor cross both the dragon's faces, a smile of sorts crossing Shaw's huge snout, _"Good, then let's begin. How much do you know about the gift you were given?"_

She frowned, the question repeating in her mind. How much did she know of the belt? She knew how it worked, feeding off of spikes in her chi flow. She knew a vague history, that it was connected to how dragon's had first taught humans to fire bend. She knew it had something to do with the unique color of her flames, as not even the Avatar had been able to get the belt to work. Beyond that information she didn't know anything, and as that crossed her mind she realized how basic the knowledge was. "Very little," she replied, frowning.

"_Of course, the history predates bending. Not even they,"_ Ran tossed his head indicating the Sun Warrior village below them, _"recognized you for what you are until you transformed."_

She looked over her shoulder at the village in slight disgust.

"_Then we shall begin at the beginning and go until we have come to the end," _Shaw gave her a warm smile, as warm as a beast of her stature could get that is.

The dragons pulled themselves fully from their caves and beat their huge wings, rising into the air.

She frowned up at the pair as they began circling above her, "What-?"

But she was cut off, _"Begin meditating, young dragon, you will understand in a moment."_

Her eyes narrowed, but she lowered herself to the ground, and crossed her legs, taking a deep breath and closing her eyes.

Her skin prickled almost immediately as she felt heat surround her. Though the sudden warm breathed with her, she knew it was not of her making, far too strong for it to have been her doing. She calmed herself quickly, relaxing into the familiarity of meditation.

When she felt her body becoming one with the heat around her, breathing, pulsing as one, she heard the breathing of the dragons, and the dull crackle of fire.

"_Open your eyes,"_ she barely heard the whisper over the roaring of her own blood in her ears, mimicking the sound of the flames. Her eyes opened slowly, adjusting to the flurry of color around her. A huge twister of flames ranging in every color imaginable surrounded her, blues danced with reds as they chased green across an orange back drop. She kept her breathing in check despite her surprise at the sight before her.

The colors shifted, green dropping to meet the ground and rise several feet giving the appearance of long grass reaching up in to a brilliant orange sky. In the sky danced an enormous golden beast. _"As I said, we shall begin with at the beginning. The first dragon was Furor."_ The huge golden dragon landed before her and rose to its hind-legs, roaring._ "He was created from a dispute between Agni and the ocean spirit La to see which could create a more powerful beast."_ The shimmering leviathan took to the skies again. _"Agni won, having created a beast strong enough to bend not only his own element, but also able to command the skies, create earthquakes, and raise tsunamis." _The dragon demonstrated each power as it was mentioned. _"But, in his quest to prove his supremacy, Agni neglected to give Furor control." _ The flames before her shifted showing Furor destroying forests and whole countries. _"As the contest between Agni and La was forgotten so was Furor. It wasn't until humans were created that Furor's lack of control became a nuisance to the Gods." _The scene changed, showing Furor tearing through a village, people running in terror from the winged menace. Far above the Gods watched the destruction.

"_In one of his rampages, a young girl stood before him and begged for mercy from the beast, asking what the cause of his hostility was. Her name was Continere." _ The huge golden beast stood snarling at the young girl standing before him. _"He slew her on the spot." _The beast's claws swung at the child before him. _"Agni intervened and instead of dying, when Furor's claws met the young girl there was a flash of light, and Furor was turned human, while his splendid scales were given to Continere, turning her into a dragon."_

Furor, now human, lay splayed out on the grass, while the new dragon looked itself over, tossing its head this way and that. A roar of terror escaped its jaws and it took to the skies. _"Continere was driven insane at first by her new power and she, like Furor before her, became a destructive monster."_ This time as the dragon before her raged, it was clearly confused and panicked more than angry as Furor's destruction had been. _"Not even those she'd loved as a human were safe."_ She felt her stomach twist as she watched the golden beast tear apart her family. _"She came to loath Furor, blaming him for her transformation, and this anger fueled her to hunt him down."_

The flames danced, shifting to show Furor standing at the edge of a cliff, staring into the ocean beyond. _"Furor had been suffering with his new form as well. Humans were given reason and control, two things Furor lacked as a beast. Memories of his destruction haunted him dreaming and waking." _ He took a breath and stepped forward, inching his way closer to the edge. _"In his misery he tried to take his own life, and it was then Continere found him."_ Far above the man the golden dragon flew, watching as he threw himself over the edge. _"Despite her anger with him, she saved him."_ The beast flew low, catching Furor before he could collide with the water.

Azula's brow furrowed at this, but held back the question she wanted to ask.

"_When she landed with him, she was human once more. She became the first of her kind, able to change between human and beast as she pleased."_

The story ended with the two standing before one another, Furor kneeling before the girl who'd saved him. Then the flames swirled together, becoming the brilliant rainbow they'd been before.

"Why would she save him?" she asked as the dragons finished their story.

"_Hmm…"_ the flames around her died down, the dragons still circling above her. _"She may be a powerful bender, but her skill with emotion needs far more work, Shaw."_

The rust colored beast gave a short laugh, _"She wouldn't be here if she had full mastery."_

She glared up at both beasts, teeth grinding at their comments, not that it wasn't something she hadn't been told. Emotions had too much of a link to fire for her to indulge in them, "Explain, what was the point of that? Why would she save him?"

"_That is for you to find out. Understanding her reason is the first step towards mastery. Meditate on it, and give us your answer at sun down,"_ The dragons disappeared into their caves.

Her teeth ground, _Iroh must have taken lessons from them on more than fire bending…_

-D.-

At sun down that day her answer had been spite. Since Furor had wanted to end his life, what worse suffering could he face than being saved from death? The dragons shook their heads and told her to go to bed and they'd pick back up in the morning. She stayed up a few extra hours fire bending to vent her frustration.

The next day was no different. They repeated the story to her again and again she was told to find out why Continere save his life. This time her answer at the end of the day was anger. Anger that he'd end his life before she could exact her revenge. Again they shook their heads and told her to go to sleep, and training would begin in the morning.

On the third night it was pride, showing to him the mercy he hadn't shown her as a human, to prove herself stronger.

On the forth night she had taken a wild guess at sympathy, that she felt his pain at being trapped in a body that was not his own. They said it was progress but she was still wrong.

A week passed in this fashion. They would retell the story each morning and give her the day to try to understand Continere's motives, and each night she would come back with a new answer, and each night she would get it wrong.

The last night that week her frustration boiled over, after Ran laughed and said, _"Agni, Shaw, she's just not getting it."_

"Forgive me for having better things to do than understanding feelings," she replied, crossing her arms over her chest.

The blue dragon lowered himself to her level, meeting her glare, _"Why should we? You're clearly in the wrong."_ A growl rumbled in her throat, but she had no come back. _"That's what I thought. You don't deserve our forgiveness, why should we give it to you?"_

"Neither did Furor," the words didn't register to her until they were out of her mouth, and it hit her like a charging moose-lion.

Both dragons were silent at her sides, smug satisfaction on their faces.

"_Understand now?" _Shaw asked, lying out across her bridge as she often did.

Azula's brows furrowed and it took her a moment to reply, "He didn't deserve it."

"_He didn't have to,"_ Ran answered.

Her frown deepened but she didn't say anything.

"_Your first lesson is over. You have at the very least identified her motives."_ Shaw took over. _"The second lesson will take longer. It is your turn to learn what Continere learned when she found Furor."_ She stood up stretching her wings. _"As human you think and then act, yet as a dragon you have trusted you instincts to guild you rather than master the beast. When you're angry you fly away from your problems or you destroy them but you do not let them go. It is time for you to forgive those you have persecuted."_

She stared at the huge scarlet beast, meeting the huge golden eyes with clear hatred of her next task.

"_Not only will this help you to leave behind what brought you here, it will also lead to your mastery. It is anger that blinds us from things that can save our lives."_ Both dragons straightened up, as Ran took over from Shaw. _"You will need to find out who it is that you need to forgive. That is your new lesson. It begins now. You will know when it is over, we cannot tell you." _ With that they each disappeared into their caves, and she was left alone.

She ground her teeth, knowing exactly where this lesson was going. Neither of the beasts had asked why she'd come to them or what she'd been fleeing, but that didn't mean they didn't somehow know- they seemed to know everything about her without her saying a word. She hated it at the same time as she took comfort in not having to explain (not that she would have regardless). She felt anger rolling in her stomach thinking of those she'd left behind.

With an irritated sigh she turned back to the stairs and looked out to the horizon and saw the mist of a storm on the ocean.

-D.-

Another week went by. This time the dragons only gave her incoherent facts, things that she could have found out through trial and error, such as not to fly in a storm because of the danger of being struck by lightning (even the most skilled fire bender could be killed by lightning and this included dragons) or things that were so obscure they were useless to her, such as the original belts being made of shed dragon skins. Now and again she'd hear something useful, like that the feathers that fanned out at the end of her tail could be manipulated into bone hard spikes, but those types of facts were few and far between.

It was on the day that marked two weeks of her stay that the storm came rolling over into the sky, hovering on the brink of release. She sat at the top of the stone steps, glaring at the gray sky. One thing she hated more than rain was hesitant rain, when the sky would darken but then hold off on its pouring.

"_Something is coming,"_ She heard Shaw rumbling behind her. Neither of the masters had left their caves yet, preferring the warmth of their caves to the impending storm.

There was a low sigh from the other cave, _"Indeed… it smells… familiar, and yet not."_

Azula frowned, taking a deep breath, but not smelling anything, and decided to ignore her teachers' words. She glared once more up at the sky, and saw the odd white shape appear, small in the distance, but growing larger. Then the familiar bellow of the huge herbivore reached her ears.

-D.-

Ty Lee had been flying for three days now, chasing a storm along the way. She knew Azula too well to think the fire bender would be predictable, and her heart sank at the idea she'd be chasing smoke. The Avatar had eluded the Fire Nation for a hundred years, Azula could very well make it ten times longer, if not never be seen again if she wished. She'd push the though away whenever it came back (and it always came back in Mai's voice, which the acrobat found somewhat funny).

Despite her efforts to push away dark thoughts, she found herself slumping slightly as she steered the huge bison through the sky, her aura significantly grayer, blending with the clouds around her. That thought made her realize she'd caught up to the storm, and, fighting her heart which told her to keep flying, lest Azula gain even more of a lead on her, she decided to land and wait out the storm.

As she descended she could see small pricks of light, fires near one end of the island below. She landed at the out skirts of the small village and was immediately surrounded by men and women in white linen and skirts, faces painted, but her eyes moved around the group quickly, but whatever she saw was quickly forgotten when her eyes met the liquid gold pair of the girl descending stones steps at one end of the village.

It wasn't until she found herself crashing into the other girl that she even recognized she'd moved at all.

-D.-

So wrapped in this second new arrival, no one noticed the war balloons landing father inland.


	8. Mates and Teachers

.

My apologies, I got a concussion in lacrosse and have not been firing on all cylinders. My hands have decided mutiny and have been messing with my typing since I started this chapter.

On with the show!

Disclaimer: ...

When she'd seen the bison she'd expected his master, and possibly the rest of the 'gaang', she hadn't expected a solo Ty Lee. The instant their eyes met the acrobat had launched at her. It took all her strength to twist the other girl's momentum so that they ended up spinning rather than falling as her own arms circled the other girl's waist.

"Ty?" She ignored the rush of heat that ran through her stomach at holding the acrobat, the exact opposite of the feeling of ice that had filled her stomach when she woke from dreams of the girl to find herself alone.

Somewhere in the next jumbled syllables that fell from the aura reader's mouth she caught her name, worried and missed, but passed that all else was a scrambled mess of words spoken to fast to be understood. She could feel the uneasy and confused looks of the Sun Warriors around her as Ty Lee continued with her rambling. She knew if she tried to speak it would be drown out, so she did one thing she knew would silence the girl in her arms, something she'd learned at a young age. She pulled the acrobat close and kissed her.

Almost immediately, as she'd expected, Ty Lee went quiet, her focus now on the fire bender's lips against her own. Before the acrobat could turn the kiss into something far more passionate than their current public location would allow, Azula pulled away, "Ty Lee, we're causing a bit of a scene," she nodded up the steps the way she'd just come, "we'll talk up there."

The slightly dazed but grinning acrobat nodded, and wriggled from Azula's grasp, practically dragging the fire bender back up the way she'd come.

-D.-

The dragons had emerged, at least partially. They each lay across their respective bridges, watching the acrobatic girl pull their so far most skilled student about like an over excited child with a new puppy. The change in the young dragon's demeanor was interesting if not amusing for her teachers. As of what they had seen the princess's conditioning had made trekking the stairs easier for her than for most, but with the acrobat's pace, even the fire bender fell to her knees upon reaching the middle ground between the two dragons.

"_Who is this girl?"_ Shaw said, stretching her long back.

Azula jumped having nearly forgotten the beasts were there until she'd heard the female dragon. Ty Lee was equally surprised at hearing the low groan of the pair, having thought them statues upon first sight.

"_Well?"_ it was Ran now, folding his wings, and watching them with something akin to interest.

She dropped her gaze to her companion, and from the look of awe still on Ty Lee's face a new realization hit her. She was the only one who could speak to the beasts.

It had never occurred to her to question her ability to speak with the dragons and if it had it was only for a brief moment before she dropped the question, believing the ancient beasts had merely picked up the ability to speak to humans long before then. It was clear by Ty Lee's reaction though, this was far from true.

Azula cleared her throat as this new realization hit, "This is Ty Lee." She introduced.

Despite not understanding the dragons the acrobat wordlessly understood Azula's introduction had been meant for them and that this meant the grunts and growls were not such simple noises to the fire bender beside her. Smiling her usual wide grin she waved up at the beasts staring down at her and saying a quick greeting before turning back to Azula awaiting the introduction of the animals before her.

The young dragon indicated each of the dragons in their turn as she introduced them by name, "Ran and Shaw."

The acrobat grinned up at them, "Are they dragons like you, or are they real dragons?"

Humor flitted across both beastly faces as the fire bender answered, "real dragons."

"They're so big! I thought you were a big dragon. And they must be very old," there was an indignant huff from Shaw at that, "but, they must be very wise," the aura reader said, to appease the huge rust colored animal.

A slight proud smile crossed the beast's huge snout, and Ty Lee sat melding into a one sided conversation with the three dragons around her. It was a trait Azula found useful since the acrobat could entertain herself and give the fire bender at least a time to think about what had happened.

She knew Ty Lee, though intelligent in her own right and possessing the uncanny ability to detect the princess's mood, wouldn't have followed her, at least not without aid in the idea. Who would have aided the girl was what perturbed her. Her brother would be on their mother's leash and there was no doubt in her mind the woman didn't want her back at the palace, where she guessed the others were. The avatar would only be mildly worried more so undoubtedly about what effects her absence had been having on the acrobat that was now with her. The only concern the water tribe siblings would have would be as far as what possible damage her bad moods could cause. Mai wouldn't care either way. As far as Toph was concerned she wasn't sure what the earth bender's opinion of her was, some mutual tolerance lay between them but she wasn't sure it would have been enough for the metal bender to prompt the acrobat's search. With no probable suspects to trace a new question emerged. Why had Ty Lee gone looking for her? Two weeks was far from her longest separation from the girl, at least one mission to quell a rebellion in the colonies had topped at nearly a month, and despite being miserable at the palace she'd stayed. What could have prompted the girl's departure?

"'Zula? What's wrong?" she hadn't noticed how long she'd spent in her own thoughts until the acrobat's dull roar of white noise stopped.

She shook the thoughts away, deciding to enjoy the company for what it was worth and question it later, "nothing, Ty." Before she could add more, Shaw's voice interrupted.

"_Perhaps our young Ty Lee would enjoy testing her acrobatics from the back a dragon?"_ the question confused Azula for a moment as the beasts had both warned her heavily against flying in a storm and as, passed when they told her the story of the first dragon, she'd never seen either of them take wing. She looked questioningly at her red mentor but the dragon gave no clues as to what she was thinking. When she relayed the message Ty Lee was more than happy to take up the offer as Azula had flat out refused to allow anyone to ride her, the question having come up once and only once.

"_Ran, would you oblige her? I have maters to attend to with Azula, even with company she still has much training to be done."_ The fire bender snorted at the words, of course the inane dragon would decide now of all times to begin a lesson.

The blue dragon stretched his wings, _"Make it quick, Shaw, the storm may be upon us any minute."_

The red dragon nodded. Azula frowned as she watched the acrobat, who looked nervously back at her fire bending counterpart, debating staying with Azula and going with the blue dragon. The princess tried her best to sound reassuring, "go ahead."

The acrobat smiled, kissed the fire bender's cheek and bounded to the waiting dragon before disappearing into the sky with him.

Once the two were away Azula turned back to her teacher, "you choose now of all times to begin teaching?"

The red beast ignored her question, _"that girl is your mate, yes?"_

The question surprised her. Her teachers were relatively unprying, unless it was pertinent to her training.

Before she could answer the dragon continued, watching her blue counterpart twist through the sky as Ty Lee somersaulted from his antlers to his back and across the span of his wings, _"She smells too much like you not to be."_ Azula's eyes followed the red dragon's up to the acrobat. _"For most dragons their mates are more important than even their fire, since their mates are more loyal than unfaithful fire."_

Azula felt unease spread through her gut as it did whenever her beastly mentors proved they knew far more about her than she would have liked.

"_Most would be elated for their mates to follow them, but you seem hesitant. Why?"_

"I hardly think that's any of your concern," she replied stiffly, disliking the dragon's curiosity.

Of course the beast's uncanny ability to read her insured the topic would not be dropped as she wished, _"You distrust her?"_ The rust colored leviathan seemed disturbed by its own discovery.

"My distrust for her is no more your business than any other part of our relationship," Azula replied, meeting the huge golden gaze as it turned to her. "And stop there before you even start, I've already forgiven her for whatever wrongs she may have been done to me."

"_It is not your mate I believe you have not forgiven."_ The words hung between them as final testament to their conversation as Ty Lee and Ran returned, Ran dropping the acrobat from his back to land in Azula's arms.

"That was amazing, 'Zula! Flying on Appa's one thing, but on a dragon!" Ty Lee began immediately recounting the flight and her aryl acrobatics. Which Azula listened to as she always did, with one ear for what points to interject and the other listening for threats while her mind drifted. The sudden scarceness of her masters was the fire bender's first warning of danger. The bellow of komodo-rhinos the second.

On the steps waited five fire nation cavalrymen. Azula recognized one as a young captain, who served directly below her on her anti-terrorism unit, he was loyal to her having been one of few officers who'd seen her prove her loyalty to her nation and not her father. A lieutenant glared at her, a man who'd been in line to be given command of the team she now headed. The other three she recognized only slightly, all officers who had at some point been a part of her unit or in line to take her place should she fail.

She narrowed her eyes and, setting Ty Lee down, asked, "what are you doing here?" she hadn't expected a military escort back to the palace.

One rough, newly minted general who harbored an obvious grudge for the princess brought his mount forward, "we are here on orders from the Fire Lord himself to capture and bring back the suspected aid to the ex-fire lord Ozai's escape. That would be you, Princess Azula."

Her mind was reeling after this revelation. After all the battles she'd fought and rebellions she'd very well single handedly ended to prove her loyalty to the Fire Nation and not to her father, for her brother to suspect her of aiding his escape was asinine. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Ty Lee shift uncomfortably as a flicker of remembrance dawn on the acrobat's face, as if she'd just been reminded of something important at the last moment. Gold met gray as thunder roared over them and the storm began.

"You knew about this?" it was a low growl from the fire bender, anger made all the more evident by the way rain evaporated before even touching the dragon.

The acrobat took a step back in surprise at the fire bender's anger. She'd seen its full force directed at others, but she'd never been the sole source before it scared her, and she cursed herself for the relief and excitement she'd felt upon finding the dragon, as the combination had made her forget the point of her hunt had been to warn her lover of what had happened while she'd been away, "Azula, I swear I was going to tell you."

Before the dragon could reply a burst of flames cut between them, reminding them both of the officers' presences.

Before she could control it the inhuman growl was ripped itself from her throat, whether at Ty Lee or at the officers who'd come to capture her she wasn't sure. The pain of transformation was a dull ache in the wake of steaming rain that washed over her, and the cracking of bones seemed a distant echo not from her, but in a split second she found herself towering over those around her.

One over powering thought came to her that she had to get away from the men trying to catch her and the girl who'd yet again betrayed her trust. Had she not been more concerned with getting away, she might have remembered the lesson her dragon mentors had taught her not long before. Never fly in a thunderstorm.

-D.-

Ty Lee couldn't help but scream to herself in the back of her head how stupid it was to have forgotten in all her excitement to tell Azula about the Dia Li's confession and of Zuko's sending a team to capture her. It was the only thing racing through her mind as she hurtled down the steps and vaulted onto Appa getting the flying bison into the air as quickly as she could and after the blue beast.

Beneath them the fire benders tried in vain to hit them, their flames making it only so far in the rain. Ahead for her Azula's huge wings beat, taking the dragon higher and farther ahead with each stroke.

Then it happened. For a split second she met the huge golden gaze of the dragon ahead of her, and then the streak of white raced down into the beast's back. The roar melted into a scream of agony, and in seconds Azula, returned to her human self, was falling from the sky.


	9. Return or Talks with Metal Dragons

.

I apologize for the lateness of my updates. Evidently stress is my only muse, but now I have a lot of it so I should be updating more often. And this chapter kind of surprised me, my editors suggested I try something new for it when I hit my last wall, and it actually made this an almost ten page chapter.

On with the show!

Disclaimer: …

Ty Lee felt a sour taste in her mouth as she watched from the door way as a healer attended the unresponsive fire bender. She felt sick with herself knowing what she'd brought Azula back to, the chains that bound the dragon to the bed she'd been put on ensuring the acrobat didn't forget. She tried to console herself with the fact a live and angry Azula was better than a dead one, but the thought didn't do much to quell the flips in her stomach.

"She'll live," the healer's words broke through her thoughts, she looked up to meet his eyes, "she'll live," he repeated, "you needn't worry about that, m'lady." She almost thanked him, until he finished with, "then she'll be back where she belongs," the disgust evident.

She managed a stiff thank you, before dismissing him as politely as she could manage through gritted teeth. It wasn't the first hostility she'd heard towards Azula from the airship's crew when she'd come back. The lieutenant, who'd taken up as second in command after Azula's captain took up her place, had been more than a little pleased with seeing his former commander wounded and chained. Others she'd seen, like the captain who'd taken Azula's place, looked on as if watching a funeral procession when she came back.

Had they been closer to the mainland she would have gone straight back to the capital and gone to Katara to heal the dragon, but then she remembered Katara was in favor of imprisoning Azula again, believing what Long Feng had told them. It wouldn't have made a difference mainland or here Azula would be on trial.

She chewed the inside of her cheek as she watched the unconscious dragon from the chair beside the bed. She prayed that Azula would wake before they reached home. They others wouldn't believe a word of what she said on the fire bender's behalf. They were too close to one another and she knew the gaang wouldn't put it past Azula to lie to the acrobat or hide things from her. Ty Lee herself wouldn't put it past her sometimes but this was something she couldn't see the other girl doing.

She had seen firsthand the dynamics of the royal family. The relationship of the princess and her father was never quite that of parent to child, more that of wolf to pup. There was some aspect of guidance, but as was true for when a pup grew into its own, there was a competitive aspect, survival of the fittest. Ozai had been at once ensuring the strongest leader would take his place as he was keeping her at arms distance knowing her as the threat that she was. It would go against everything she'd been taught by her father to free him. If Ty Lee knew anything about Azula as far as her family was concerned, it was that conscious of it or not, Azula would always fall back on what her father had taught her. Ozai had lost, therefore he was weak and not to be bothered with. No amount of love the girl could have for her father would override that most basic of rules. If only the others could understand that.

Ty Lee let out a sigh as she leaned back in the chair, she'd never be able to explain that to the others. Talking she could do, but articulating more complicated ideas was Azula's forte. Not for the first time in that hour did she wish the dragon would wake.

-D.-

"Enter," Long Feng snapped at the door to his office when he heard the knock. His ribs still hurt, though they were no longer broken after being seen to by a water tribe healer. He'd hidden his surprise when the Fire Lord had given him, and his agents, free movement about the Fire Nation capital on the condition they remained to be witness to Azula's trial when she was found and brought back. He'd agreed, skeptical of the Fire Lord's generosity at first. He'd expected to be believed, knowing the thin ice the gaang and the dragon were on with one another, but to be freed out right? He shook his head; the new Fire Lord had much to learn about trust.

"Sir," the voice of one of his agents brought him from his thoughts.

"Yes, what is it?" his annoyance with the man showed through in his voice. For the past three days he'd heard nothing of the absent princess's whereabouts. It made him uneasy to think she'd gotten away with such ease, but he didn't expect any less challenge from the girl who'd pulled his nation from under his feet.

The agent cleared his throat before announcing his news, "A hawk just arrived from the Fire Lord's search party. They are bringing the princess back; she's been badly wounded but is still alive."

He nodded slightly, dismissing the man as the information seeded new plans in his head.

-D.-

Toph remembered a conversation she'd once had with Iroh before he'd left to his tea shop in Ba Sing Sai. He'd told her about how he'd strengthened his fire bending by learning from the other elements. She'd been skeptical until she put more thought into it. Now more than ever since that conversation did she think the others of their group should have taken to heart the number one rule of earth bending: Wait and listen.

The group had been divided since Zuko had told them what Long Feng had said, and not evenly by a long shot. She and, an albeit absent, Ty Lee didn't believe a word of it. Aang had no idea which side to take as he harbored distrust for Long Feng but still didn't think it unlike Azula to have done something like this. Katara and Sokka were both adamantly against the dragon, and since Ursa seemed to believe Azula had been born to plague her and her son and was vehemently against the girl's innocence in the matter Zuko too was against his sister.

Even without being there to voice her side Azula had been convicted and condemned, and that pissed Toph off. There was a reason defendants were given their fair shake to tell their side of a story and to simply decide the verdict without giving her a chance was just wrong.

The day Zuko had told them of Long Feng's story, she'd shouted over the chorus of 'I knew it's' from Katara and Sokka, asking how they knew the man wasn't lying. The others had been quick to point out Azula's track record with the truth, and before the idea of letting her interrogate him could be brought up it was shot down.

_Heaven forbid we actually find out the truth_ she thought, blowing her bangs up with a puff of air before deciding the best way to alleviate her irritation with the others was to go smash stuff. That always helped.

-D.-

It was made abundantly clear the two children were nowhere near the same. Where Zuko had screamed when she would set him in his crib and had loved being coddled, Azula hated being held unless strictly necessary. Where Zuko had spent his infancy wailing through the night at all hours, Azula had slept soundly even as a newborn. Where Zuko was unsure, Azula was confident. Perhaps it was that particular aspect that had unnerved her the most.

She remembered her own youth, the uncertainty of it and how she clung to her parents' guidance. She remembered it being almost instinctive for her to follow their advice. The first thing she could remember doing without direction had been marrying Ozai, though she knew they had had a hand in grooming her for the role as princess.

Then came Zuko. It was having him that had made her feel her direction shift. Suddenly she was the guide to her children and she took up the mantle with a certain amount of pride, vowing her children would always be loved and led through their uncertainties.

Zuko had gladly accepted it, and she loved him for it. His lack of self confidence and his trust in her had boosted her own self-assurance. She'd been sure with him that her purpose had always been to be a mother.

Azula had not. As soon as she could walk on her own Azula had been just that: on her own. In spite of that Ursa had tried to guide her daughter on the path of a proper royal lady, but no matter what she attempted, it never worked. When she was told no, and directed away from what she wanted to do, Azula responded with the question, "Why?" When Ursa tried explaining, Azula listened with rapt attention. The first time Ursa had thought it was because she'd gotten through to her daughter, only for Azula to ask, "What if I don't want to?"

It was a question Ursa had never asked as a child, and when she'd heard it from a young Azula, she was caught off guard. It had never occurred to her to be anything but what she was, or what her parents had asked her to be. Hearing Azula at a young age already beginning to distance herself from the role of princess to her favored one as general had stunned her. After that day, Ursa left her daughter mainly to her own devices. Not because she'd come to terms with the idea that her daughter had a path in life of her own and needed no direction, but because she didn't know how to deal with such a path. Zuko she could understand, she'd already been encouraging him to follow his Uncle's lead, and she'd expected Azula would fall in to follow her.

In a last ditch effort to try and make the girl something of what she'd imagined she would be before she was born, Ursa rather forcefully suggested sending her to The Royal Academy.

She'd expected the unruly, independent little girl to come back confused about her world after a proper schooling and seek out her mother's guiding hand, but it was not to be. In a way she had gotten her wish, Azula had become confused, but not on her place or what she should be. Rather to the point that the headmaster wrote constantly detailing Azula's inability to socialize with the other girls. Until Ty Lee.

Ty Lee had made Azula better and worse. The girl curbed the appetite for destruction that had developed alongside Azula's independence, calming her down in that respect. But, as for Ursa's goals, the young acrobat could be credited with the destruction of any chance Ursa had had at getting Azula to follow her. The grey eyed girl, with her own need to be outside of her family's expectations, fed Azula's need to follow her own path. It had first driven Ursa to refuse to allow the other girl at the palace, after which Azula had become outright volatile. Though her father approved of her new hostility, Ursa found her patience growing thinner with each day of Azula's worsening behavior.

"_Azula, enough is enough, there is no need to be acting like this!" she snapped as she pulled the girl away from her brother, who'd just been attacked for some unheard comment about Azula being sent away for good next time._

_Azula folded her arms and said nothing, her usual reaction to being yelled at by her mother as of late, staring off and grunting when she asked something._

_The reaction pushed her further than she'd thought it would and her next words surprised even herself, "I can't believe your behavior, Azula. You've been nothing but a holy terror to everyone here. Is that what you want to be? Instead of a lady, you'd rather be a monster?"_

_It was the first time she'd ever seen her daughter look hurt. It was only a split second, a flash like lightning though golden eyes. When it was gone there was a hard look, a look that shouldn't have been: tired acceptance. The girl gave her expected monosyllabic grunt and turned to walk away from whatever else her mother could have said._

The rest of the day Azula had tried her best to stay scarce, excluding meals, during which she tried to remain as far from her mother as possible. It was as if she'd been physically struck by the angry shout. That night, she'd tried to appease the young girl, tucking her into bed as she did for Zuko every night, but which she hadn't done for Azula since she was a toddler.

_Azula watched her carefully. "What do you want, mother?" The words were strained, though with what Ursa couldn't tell._

"_I came to tuck you in," she said, trying her best to smile at the young girl._

_Azula looked taken aback for a moment, before simply looking away and nodding, grudgingly accepting her mother's presence._

_Ursa knew as soon as she brought the blankets up that something had indefinitely been lost between them. That hard, cold look in Azula's eyes never left, even as she put out the candle and they said their goodnights._

After that Ursa had allowed Ty Lee over, if only to keep Azula from the beastly behavior she'd had, and it worked. Though she knew, as if feeling it, that there was no reconciling with her daughter. She still tried, through letting the acrobat over as often as Azula liked, and though the pair's closeness made her uncomfortable, it also made Azula's attitude bearable. With her hostilities at least curbed, Ursa left the girl alone more, directing her attention to Zuko. Each day she felt her connection with him more than ever with that gap growing between her daughter and herself. She watched from afar as Ozai worked Azula tirelessly when Ty Lee wasn't there, and saw that cold hardening in Azula's eyes grow darker.

After she'd left, she'd receive news now and again of what went on on the main land. Shortly after her own departure Ty Lee had run away to the circus, disowned by her family for it. She heard that Azula's flames had turned blue after something to do with the girl before she'd left, but she hadn't paid enough attention to find out what.

Then Zuko was sent away, and Ursa knew with no one in the palace but her father and herself, Azula's hostile nature would come out more and more, and Ozai would sharpen it into the weapon he wanted it to be.

The more she thought on it the more she shook her head at her daughter's actions. Even without the knowledge of the Dai Li, she knew only one person would be so devoted to the former Fire Lord to destroy a prison to see him free. Why Zuko hadn't been faster to send men after his sister she didn't know. The more she thought of what sort of beast her daughter had become over the years, the more disappointed she become of her second born. A hundred 'if onlys' played through her head. If only Azula had listened more to her mother then going off on her own. If only she'd been more assertive in the raising of her second child. If only, if only, if only.

She was so wrapped in her own thoughts she didn't notice the young earth bender crossing her path.

"Watch it!" she heard the surprised warning from the blind girl a second before she found herself falling back. A strong, callused hand grabbed her wrist and pulled her up to her feet before she could hit the ground.

"Hello to you too, Toph," Ursa said, as she recovered from her surprise and looked at her surroundings. She'd been on her way to one of the palace gardens but had been so caught in her own thoughts she'd passed it and continued walking. Though after such a train of thought she was in need of a better distraction than feeding turtle-ducks, "what are you up to today?" she took some pride in noting her desperation for a distraction was not in her voice.

The earth bender rolled her neck, answering after she heard a few satisfying pops, her gruff reply after a moment, "gonna go smash stuff, helps me think."

The girl was rough in her way, but it was a pleasant distraction from the thoughts of her children and the proper upbringing of royalty, "may I join you? Watching, I mean, I doubt 'smashing' anything would help me think."

"Sure…" the blind girl looked taken a back for a moment, "whatever you wanna do." She shrugged before leading the way to one of the larger outdoor training areas. The earth all around was torn apart and stood in jagged spikes here and there. Swords and armor that had lost their use when the guard staff had been downsized were in disarray here and there battered and broken.

The damage looked like it had been done by a beast instead of the tiny bender beside her.

"Did you spar with Azula here?" Ursa asked, imagining the young girl trading blows with the blue monster she'd seen her daughter turn into.

"Nope, this was all me," Toph replied, cracking her knuckles. She dug her heel into the ground, swept low to one side, and the earth moved, smoothing back to its proper place. She repeated to the other direction and it happened again on the other side. Now only the broken armor and weapons lay in the middle of the yard. A flick of her wrist upwards and the armor stood by itself, holes mending. The weapons straightened and took their proper shapes in the empty gauntlets. Ten empty suits of armor stood before them holding swords and spears.

Ursa was, for want of a better word, amazed. She'd seen earth bending of course, but metal bending? Never, and Toph did it with ease.

"Oh my…" was all she managed, staring at the standing armor.

"Metal bending," the earth bender said a wolfish grin across her face, "it's why I'm the greatest earth bender in the world," As if to demonstrate she began making the suits of armor move before them.

Ursa felt her own smile grow at the pride in the girl's voice, "your parents must be proud of you, helping train the avatar, and developing a new branch of bending."

Toph laughed outright at that, "they hate it. They think I should be a delicate little nobleman's daughter, I'd rather be an earth bender."

The older woman frowned at that. There was no way the girl before her was any sort of noble. She'd never really asked about the backstories of any of her son's friends, and had simply assumed from her nature that Toph was a farmer's daughter or had grown up in a city discontented with the Fire Nation.

As if sensing her confusion Toph began to explain, "My parents are the richest nobles in the earth kingdom. Hell, they could probably buy this palace if they wanted and still have money left. They freaked when I was born blind and thought I would be the fragile little thing that would always be dependent on them. I hated them for the longest time for it."

Ursa felt a slight flip in her stomach as she remembered the births of her children, what she'd imagined they'd grow up to be, and how much it had confused and angered her that Azula wanted nothing to do with the future she'd planned. She sympathized for a moment with the girl's parents and their wishes for their daughter to have a good life. She'd wanted the same for her children too, hadn't she? She'd wanted Zuko to grow up to be the leader their country needed, and for Azula to become the princess of fairy tales, the one who was fought over by prince charmings, not the one who fought.

"They," she paused, wondering if she should try to defend the girl's parents to her, "they wanted you to have a happy life, I'm sure. It's all parents ever want." She thought of the lives she'd imagined for her own children, and how dutifully Zuko had stepped up to that role, and how quickly Azula defied it.

Toph laughed again. "They wanted me to live the life they planned out for me. To them it was happy, but to me it was hell." She brought two slabs of earth up on either side of the living armor and brought them together to the satisfying sound of metal being smashed. When the earthen slabs retreated back into the ground the armor and weaponry was a melded disk of metal.

"_What if I don't want to?"_ a young Azula's voice rang in her head as she thought about the earth bender's words. She shook it off though. Azula would have been happier if she'd only listened to her mother and been content in her station. She wasn't happy now, Ursa was sure of it. Azula was never happy. Even as a child she'd always been volatile, always angry with her mother, with her father, with herself, never herself, only ever happy with her fire and Ty Lee.

"The formalities, all the stuffy pompous crap, the _rules_. It was a prison with frilly clothes and stuck up people." The earth bender wrinkled her nose as she pried apart one set of armor from another. "They thought it was best because they thought I was this breakable little thing that was completely dependent on them, but once I learned how to earth bend," her voice turned rough as she wrestled for a moment with a particularly stubborn gauntlet stuck in a breastplate, "I could be independent. They weren't so happy with that." She held the now pried off glove in the air for a moment with bending as it took its shape once more, before closing her fist, making it fold in on itself until it was a compacted ball.

Ursa watched and listened, thinking of her own two children. She remembered her own anxiety as a parent, thinking of how her children needed her, how worried she'd been when they started fire bending, and how much she'd tried to discourage Azula. Zuko at least would need it one day as Fire Lord, and at the time was terrified of it after almost burning himself. As for Azula, she wouldn't need her's. She, as princess, would grow up to marry and go on to be a mother. That had been the life Ursa had seen for her, one of safety and happiness in the palace. One where all the things Azula had excelled at were unnecessary. She shook that thought from her head. Azula had only excelled at them because her father had been an evil man and had turned the girl's restless independence into a focused weapon.

"Doesn't matter now though, does it? They made their choice, I made mine," She cracked her neck and began molding the rest of the armor, into what, Ursa couldn't say.

"What if they wanted to talk to you? Make amends?" the older woman asked, thinking of her disastrous attempt at talking to Azula. She'd been told by Zuko and a few of his friends about the events at the end of the war, and of Azula's lapse in sanity. They'd thought it would be good to reconcile the two, and that maybe it would help calm the fire bender's temper. It was luck finding her alone for once, since it seemed as if where ever Azula was, Ty Lee followed. She didn't think she could talk to her daughter in the acrobat's disruptive presence.

Toph shrugged, "Doubt they would. I've tried to get them to, but the thing about talking to someone is you both have to listen. I guess it's the only thing me and them have in common, neither of us is really good at letting the other one talk." She paused, as if taking a moment to assess her work, though to Ursa it still looked like an unintelligible mess of metal. "But I guess that's the Earth Nation nobles' way," a rueful grin crossed her face, "ignore the problem, or butt heads until one cracks." The earth bender had taken a few steps back, and again Ursa was confused, seeing the enormous ball of metal before them with no distinguishing features, but chose to ignore it.

"It's better than the Fire Nation I suppose." The bitterness in the princess's voice was evident as she thought of her own nation and the conversation she'd attempted to have with her daughter. "The Fire Nation way seems to be to destroy anything that doesn't agree. At least there's an opportunity for compromise when you only butt heads."

One of Toph's famously wolfish grins crossed her face as she moved, molding the metal ball before them, "I learned something about 'the Fire Nation way' from Sparky and Twinkle Toes, and hell even Beasty showed it sometimes when she was around Ty. Sure, destruction is the first thing you'd think would happen, but it you're careful enough around it and you feed it the right things, fire can be just as helpful as harmful." She dropped her hands, her work before her complete. "And speaking of feeding things, I'm hungry now. See ya, Mama Bear."

Ursa said her own good bye to the girl, before turning to look at Toph's handy work. She jumped and a hand flew to her chest in surprise when she found herself staring down a huge, metal dragon.


	10. Let Sleeping Monsters Lie

.  
>I'd like to apologize for the wait. I rewrote this chapter a hundred times and am still iffy about it, a friend of mine joked I need to put a 'deleted scenes' thing up because of how many drafts I have for this chapter. Also I have no artistic ability past guns and me and my nephew, so if anyone is interested please feel free to draw some stuff to go along with this story or Draco. I would love you for it! Post it on Devi and tell me. I would love to see what y'all can do and if I'll probably ask nicely to us it as the cover art here for the stories. Thank you and as always:<p>

On with the show!

Disclaimer: …

_She sat, curled into herself under the huge garden tree. Her father had been working her tirelessly in training and she was taking advantage of one of her few reprieves from the pain and fatigue that came with. It had been a month since she'd come back from academy and she hated every second. Her mother had let Ty Lee over once the first day she'd come back, but had refused since without explanation. It had angered the young princess like nothing else her mother had ever done, because it hurt._

_She'd hated the academy until she'd met Ty Lee, and then it changed. She came to love it there, if only because she had the other girl to play with. The headmaster had been ready to send her back to the palace, until she'd made friends with the acrobat. The pink loving girl was a little off, yes, but she didn't care, the aura reader had given her something that no one had ever given her: unconditional love. Even when she'd play a little too rough or say something meaner than she'd meant to the acrobat would let it go and praise her for something entirely unrelated. It had been odd at first but then the fire bender began craving it, needing that little bit of absolute adoration. Now she had none. She was back to having to overcome her brother's short comings to her father, and with no idea how to please her mother. Hadn't that been the point of the academy? For her to make friends? She was so confused. _

_After a moment of the conflicted thoughts her head began to hurt, anger and confusion mixing, into undirected frustration._

"_Azula, get out, mom and me are gonna feed the turtle-ducks!" her brother called into the garden, walking out with a loaf of bread._

_She glared at him, the unfocused anger suddenly zeroing in on her brother, "I can stay here if I want dum-dum."_

"_Nuh-uh, mom doesn't want you here," her brother replied, glaring at her and trying to look intimidating, even though she was almost as tall as him._

_It hurt, but she wouldn't show it, glaring right back at him and about to retort until he beat her to it._

"_Why else would they send you away for so long?" he smirked at her. He'd never been sent out of the palace for anything, though their father had tried to send him to the boys' academy._

"_Shut your mouth, Zuzu, or I'll shut it for you," she growled, fist clenched at her sides._

_He swallowed, knowing his sister had been in a violent mood since she'd come back. He said nothing, and she turned back to take up her place under the tree. But of course her brother wasn't as smart as she'd thought he'd become, and under his breath, thinking she wouldn't hear it, he whispered, "Maybe next time it'll be for good."_

_It set her off like a misplaced arrow in a moose-lion's flank. In a second she was on him, no flames, just fists. Even without using her bending, her brother ended up with a bloody nose and black eye. _

"_Azula!" her mother grabbed her arm roughly as she made to take another swing, "enough is enough! There is no need to be acting like this!"_

_The sudden spark of anger and energy died, turning into simmering embers in her gut. It was just like her mother to come at the last second, when she could only see one side._

_The young princess folded her arms across her chest and stared away towards the other side of the garden, away from her mother. It had become a habit in the academy to shut down when she was being yelled at or disciplined- a habit her father had approved of, since it was better than crying. He mistook it for her listening to him. Her mother mistook it for her ignoring the older woman. In reality she was simply trying not to cry in frustration for not being able to speak her side. _

"_I can't believe your behavior, Azula." She held back a snort; her behavior wouldn't be bad if Ty Lee was there. "You've been nothing but a holy terror to everyone here." Her mother grabbed her arm roughly and turned her so they were eye to eye, the older woman having knelt down, anger in her eyes, "Is that what you want to be? Instead of a lady, you'd rather be a monster?"_

'_You'd rather be a monster.' The words rang in her head, the implication clear even to her young ears, 'you are a monster.' As if someone had turned off her bending, all her blood ran cold. Her mother thought she was a monster. It made her sick and dizzy and it hurt. Worse than the soreness of her muscles at the end of training, worse than when she would accidently burn herself, worse than anything she'd ever felt, it hurt. _

_She hid it as quickly as she'd felt it, grunting her acknowledgement of her mother's words and fleeing just as quickly._

_Everything in her chest hurt. Her mother thought she was a monster. Was she? Was that why her mother was so cold to her? Was that why she'd taken Ty Lee away from her, because she feared her monster daughter would hurt her? Was that why she herself had been sent away? The pain and hurt of the words paved the way for guilt._

_Monster… maybe she was. If so, than it would make sense. She swallowed hard. If she was a monster she wouldn't deserve love, she'd deserve the fear and anger she was met with. Wouldn't she? She'd made it to her room by the time she'd gotten to that thought and looked dully around. Her feet took her to the huge floor length mirror that took up a large portion of one wall. Her reflection was in shadow- the curtains had been drawn for the day to keep the furniture from bleaching. She raised a hand and lit a small fire ball to see herself clearly. What she saw made her next breath sharp. The fire light exposed her reflection with blood smattering her clothes and hands. Here and there dirt mixed in from the garden's soil that had been upturned in the beating. Her own image scared her for a moment._

"_Monster."_

-D.-

Ty Lee jumped awake. She hadn't meant to fall asleep, fearful that Azula would wake up angry. She looked around the airship's small room for the noise that had woken her, and found it to be the unconscious fire bender. Azula was restless in her dreams, twisting and struggling with her bonds. The smell of burning skin met her nose, and she looked down to see smoke rising from the metal shackles around the princess's wrists as she pulled at the restraints.

"'Zula, don't do that! You're just burning yourself!" the acrobat grabbed the princess's hands in her own, trying to calm the still sleeping, struggling girl. Of course it did little to still the dragon, and instead the fire bender gripped the acrobat's forearms and pulled her from the ground in her struggles. Panicked at suddenly being lifted and feeling the heat of the princess's hands rising Ty Lee hit a point in the middle of the fire bender's arm. Azula's hands cooled almost instantly, loosening their grip on her arms. She had to catch herself when Azula relaxed again and let her go completely.

She looked from the sleeping fire bender to the uncomfortable chair she'd been settled into a moment before. Self preservation was overridden by the longing for the other girl, and the need for the comfort and warmth of the dragon's body. Her own sleep had been restless since Azula had left and now that they were together again she couldn't bring herself to move away. She knew the guards would be unhappy but she couldn't bring herself to care. She shifted herself onto the bed and Azula, pressing her ear to the dragon's chest, over the fire bender's heart. The slow familiar rhythm lulled her to sleep.

-D.-

_The nightmares were back, and with them came the hallucinations. She'd been out of the asylum for a month now, and while she'd vastly improved she had yet to fully recover. One day she was fine, the next she was trailed and trialed by ghosts. The episodes were fewer but their intensity grew worse each time. She never told the others, not even Ty Lee. Her freedom was tentative and while the others tolerated her bad moods she was more than sure they would not hesitate to toss her back in her cell if there was even a slight chance she was still unstable. So she suffered through her hallucinations and nightmares in silence, lashing out at the others when it became too much to handle. _

_Her loss of sleep to the nightmares, combined with the dull roar of obscenities the visage of her father shouted at her back and the mountain of work her brother had pawned off to her guarantied it would be a lashing out day. The palace staff had developed a sixth sense for her bad moods and learned to avoid her. The members of the gaang had taken the hint when she'd set her brother's food on fire at lunch and had made themselves scarce. But there was one person who would never leave her side, no matter how badly she lashed out._

_She knew it was partly for Zuko's request that Ty Lee watched her, and more so out of the acrobat's love for her. Normally the other girl was a comfort to her on the days when everything was too much, but today was not going to be so simple. Not when it was Ty Lee her hallucinations decided to target._

"_She'll turn on you again you know. But you probably don't care. You enjoy playing lap dog to a faithless bitch so long as it keeps your bed warm." Her father's voice growled, for her ears alone. _

_She held in the retort that longed to be snapped back, trying hard to continue her training. Ty Lee sat on the sidelines watching and applauding her private performance. Ozai stood in the sparing grounds with her, glaring her down as she ignored him._

"_That's right, continue your show for your mistress, mutt. Degrade a century's worth of your ancestors and your own pride to entertain your whore." _

_She swung at him, glad that she'd already been taking down invisible foes so that it seemed a part of her training to the watching acrobat. Glad also for the roar of flames that drowned her own low growl, "Shut up. That's not true, and you know it."_

_He snorted at her, "If it weren't true you wouldn't care." He growled back, dodging the blast without moving._

_It was true in part. Since she'd returned to the palace she'd felt like the acrobat's pet. The fierce dragon caught and collared willingly. People still respected and feared her enough to give her the proper graces, but she had taken notice of people's changed demeanors when the acrobat was with her. They took more liberties with their actions. Alone she was still the feared and terrible war hound created from a century's worth of fighting prowess, but with the acrobat she was leashed and tame. She hadn't been bothered by it at first, until people began using it against her._

_It had started with people simply running to Ty Lee like scared children to their mother when she'd do something they found reprehensible. Then it progressed to people using Ty Lee's kindness to get her to twist the dragon's arm into doing things she normally would have refused. She'd found herself pulled into things like continuing the Avatar's fire bending training and taking over dealings with the Colonies, despite her only true obligation being to quell rebellions._

_Regardless of the truth of it she continued attacking him. Each blast of fire he dodged, simply fading to the side, at times the flames went straight through him but left him untouched. While her attacks left him unharmed, his own verbal assault left her with new wounds at every word._

"_This is far from your best work. Have you gotten lazy or is it that you've moved your focus from the battle field to the bedroom?" He snorted out. "Perhaps I am wrong about which one of you is the whore."_

_Her teeth barred and she snarled in frustration at him. She was only vaguely aware that Ty Lee was beginning to get uneasy on the sidelines, noticing her lover's distress._

"_You've become no better than your brother. Wings clipped by your hormones and muzzled by some girl. At least he had the good graces to choose a nobleman's daughter, not a circus freak."_

_She could hear her own growl low in her throat, but missed the gentle whisper of her name from the girl who had been watching passively but now stood worried by the fire bender's erratic behavior._

"_You and I both know your nature."He dodged another blow, and circled behind her. "You are a wild animal no better than a monster. If she does not betray you first, you will inevitably bite the hand that feeds." He'd disappeared, the fire glancing harmlessly through him. A sharp cry from the girl he'd been in front of proved Ty Lee was not so lucky._

_Her anger dissipated as soon as she heard the pained sound from the acrobat."Ty Lee! What were you thinking getting in the way like that?" She pulled the girl to her, inspecting the burn that the acrobat tried in vain to cover._

_It wasn't a bad burn, not at all on the level of Zuko's. It would heal without scaring. "I was worried…" the acrobat replied looking at Azula through her lashes. "You were… You seemed angry…Angry the way you usto get between meds…"The acrobat wasn't looking at her now. It didn't matter. The tears she knew the girl was repressing were enough to fill her stomach with guilt. Never mind that her anger had exposed the fact she was not fully recovered. Guilt overpowered any dread she might have felt at being discovered and she quickly dragged Ty Lee away to find Katara. The water bender glared at her the entire time, muttering under her breath reasons the acrobat should leave the princess though neither of them truly cared what the water tribe girl said._

_When it was all said and done the acrobat was left unmarred, the burn completely healed. The only one who could see the scar was the princess herself, and she always saw it, a constant reminder of her father's words. "You are a wild animal, no better than a monster. If she does not betray you first, you will inevitably bit the hand that feeds." _

"_A monster…"_

-D.-

The slow beat that had put her to sleep sped up, waking her when it turned to a thunderous roar beneath Azula's skin. The acrobat sat up and looked down at the fire bender. The dragon's breathing had become erratic. Wisps of blue fire escaped her mouth with each quick heavy exhale. She sighed, feeling the weight of her own exhaustion. She'd dealt with these types of nightmares. Nightmares that made Azula twist and cry out and had led to the replacement of the bed canopies on more than one occasion from accidental flames.

She shifted so that her mouth was near Azula's ear and began stroking her cheek soothingly, whispering for her to calm down. Slowly, painfully so, the princess's breathing slowed, and her arms tightened around the acrobat as much as the chains would allow, before she relaxed fully.

Too tired to move back to her original place, Ty Lee closed her eyes in relief at getting the princess to calm and was asleep just as quickly.

-D.-

"_You __were__ fire. Cruel and ruthless and powerful."_

"_My own mother thought I was a monster…"_

"_When you're angry you fly away from your problems or you destroy them..."_

"_She __didn't want me to become a real monster."_

"_Monster… You have no idea."_

"_Instead of a lady, you'd rather be a monster."_

"_She already has blood on her hands from carelessness, you and I both know that."_

"_You are a wild animal, no better than a monster."_

Azula groaned, feeling as if she'd been hit by a monorail. She remembered the rain battering her scales, and looking back over her shoulder to see Ty Lee flying after her and then pain. Intense, unbearable pain and suffocating darkness that came with loss of consciousness. Her body's pain and her mental exhaustion from restless sleep kept her lying still where she woke.

Her eyes searched the room, assessing her surroundings without having to move. She found herself in a room with smoothed stone walls. A high, barred window served as the only source of light to be found. She shifted, gritting her teeth when her body complained about the movement and found a wall of bars divided the room in half. A cold stone dropped into her stomach. She was in a prison cell, and she was alone.


	11. Broken Armor

.

I will finish this! I do apologize, I have no excuse. You guys have been awesome and deserve a better author than I.

Also, I don't often respond to reviews, but this one got under my skin:

_Anonymous:_

_The premise of the story is really interesting, and I wanted to enjoy it, but Azula's OOC language is stopping me dead. She isn't the type of character to use profanity (she uses extraordinarily proper speech most of the time and prides herself on her composure), so it comes across as jarring and unflattering. She conveys anger easily in the show, without swearing, so there's literally no need to have her use it. It doesn't even sound like her when you do that. It's really too bad, because Azula becoming a dragon is pretty much perfect for her._

Alright… So… I went back through my entire story, just for you. I thought maybe if this could throw one person off it could throw others off…I found only two instances (one of which you probably didn't even get to since you stopped at chapter two), when Azula calls her mother a bitch, and when she says her father wouldn't have given a damn about her if she wasn't a prodigy. I completely agree that Azula is classier than cussing, thus the relevance of her cursing in both cases. At those points she was angry enough to lose her composure and thus fall to vulgarities of the common people. She was angry and hurt, beyond the extent of using her typically wide vocabulary.

Please reviewer, read the rest of the fic before you make a comment generalizing, and dismissing it for one or two words, especially since you were only on chapter two. (I do it constantly when I read something with the word 'cajoled' 'moist' or 'underneath' and end up loving fics despite my hatred of those words) Also, may I ask, did you read the prequel? If you did and enjoyed that, then I think you can forgive me two words. Seriously, if you "wanted to enjoy it" just fucking enjoy it.

"It's really too bad" my ass.

Anyway…

On with the show!

Disclaimer: …

Five guards had attempted to wrestle her from the airship's infirmary with no success, Ty Lee was not about to abandon the out cold fire bender. It had taken the gaang an additional half hour to pry her away from the dragon so that the soldiers could carry the girl out to the waiting prison carriage. The acrobat demanded to be allowed to go with her, but her requests fell on deaf ears. Resignedly she complied after the prison carriage took off in the opposite direction of the coach they'd forced her into. She watched from the back window as Azula was carted away to a prison cell and bitterly thought of how she was being dragged to the same.

She curled herself into her seat and stared out the window blinking away tears. Her carriage mates were clearly uncomfortable- silence was not common for the acrobat- shifting and attempting to talk only to be shot down by a glare from gray eyes. The look should have been ineffective since it was two parts pain and sadness and only one part anger, but because of its rarity no one was accustom to reacting to it. When they did finally reach the palace she was the first out the door and made a bee line for Azula and her shared room. There she could be alone and no one would bother her, even with the dragon gone no one was foolish enough to come snooping through her lair.

But, as fate would have it, her escape to privacy ended up leading her by the gardens a certain royal inhabited and her usually unheard of temper flared to life like a wild fire.

-D.-

"This is all because of you!" Ursa was taken aback by the outburst, especially when she realized it had come from the normally laid back, carefree Ty Lee. "Why couldn't you have just left her alone? It's not like you ever gave a damn about her before!"

The fire in the acrobat's grey eyes sparked a like flame in the older woman that made her bristle and pushed her to the defensive. "Who are you to tell me that I can't talk to my own daughter?" She replied, temper easily rising with the girl's impudence. "If anything her actions are _your_ fault. If you didn't encourage that reproachable behavior of hers she might have been normal."

"_Normal_?!" Ty Lee's voice almost cracked on the word, "_You_, of all people, blame her for not being _normal_? How could she be, after what you did to her? Every doubt, all the self-blame, all those little voices in 'Zula's head that drove her crazy, all of them were put there by you! You could never just accept her for her, you had to pick and pick until she thought she was a monster!"

Ursa recoiled at the words as if the acrobat had struck her. She remembered what her daughter had said to her, _"You called me a monster_,_"_ remembered that defining moment when the rift between mother and daughter had become apparent-_ "Instead of a lady, you'd rather be a monster"_- with that same word. Could that really have been her doing? Her voice stuttered for a moment, but her pride wouldn't let her concede. "I'm not the one who turned her into that beast. That was all her father's doing. If she'd stayed away from that horrible man and away from _you_ and your…" she paused searching for a word to describe the girl's influence on her daughter.

There were angry tears welling in the aura reader's grey eyes as they glared back into Ursa's gold. "Me and my what?" the words were low and heated. "What exactly have I ever done to hurt 'Zula? Was it me who sent her away to boarding school? Was it me who pushed her away 'cause she wasn't what I wanted her to be? Was it me who called her a monster and made her hate herself?" The girl's tears began to streak her cheeks in hot, wet lines. "No, I've never hurt her. That was all you. Always you."

Ursa could only sputter angrily as the younger woman stormed away, having vented herself to tears.

-D.-

By the time Ty Lee reached the room her tears had come to an end, her anger simmered and died in her chest leaving behind a dull ache. She entered still sniffing, wiping at her eyes, but the fire had died. Exhaustion had taken its place, and the sight of the plush silk covered bed called to her. Without a thought she collapsed on the thick covers after closing the door. The sun had bathed the blankets in mocking warmth, reminiscent of the absent fire bender. Out of habit she rolled onto her side and looked at the half of the bed Azula typically occupied.

"_Ty Lee, get back to your side!"_

"_But 'Zula, you're sooo warm and its sooo cold on my side."_

"_It's the middle of summer!"_

The memory flashed through her mind as she looked at the empty, permanent divot the fire bender had left. The acrobat hadn't moved even after the argument was made and Azula hadn't pushed any farther. They'd both woken up soaked in sweat that morning, when their combined body heat, the blankets and the sun became too much for them. The fire bender had risen and donned her armor, while Ty Lee had curled into the vacated spot and slept a few more hours.

The acrobat's eyes flickered up to the armoire that stood against the wall. Unbidden she rose from the comfort of the warm bed and went to the dark wood doors. Within she found the black and gold steel that Azula had preened over since the day she'd received it. Flawless and shimmering in the sunlight let in from the window, Ty Lee traced the detailed engravings, designating the rank of a general and status as a dragon, both new additions since the fire bender's return barely a year before.

"_Milady, there is a slight dent in the back, would you like me to fix that as well?" the elderly smith was trembling._

_Azula's temper preceded her, "What dent? I've kept that armor pristine." The hiss was a low threat that dared the old man to contradict the dragon._

"_Of course, milady, my mistake."_

Carefully Ty Lee turned the armor stand to view the back plates, her fingers finding the imperceptible dip that the expert craftsman had seen. Azula's dismissal had caused him to leave it for fear of punishment for altering the steel in any way he wasn't ordered.

To the dragon's credit the single blemish could easily be dismissed as a trick of the light catching on the polished metalwork. So far the acrobat had been the only one to notice the mark, because she was the one to put it there.

The memory made her stomach sink…

_Her skin is sticky with sweat and humidity, but her insides are undeniably frozen. Everything is falling apart and all she can do is stand and watch and pray the two stop before things go too far out of hand. _

_A voice in the back of her mind tells her she knows better than to expect that. Azula had been slipping for months (though breaking for years sounds more appropriate to the acrobat) and Mai has been itching for the chance to rebel, to be free from everyone (anyone) else's control; that it happened to be Azula was only a matter of chance. Now she's forced to choose between them, a choice she's never wanted to make, and it seems fate had conspired against all of them by putting her beside Azula in that moment (it's a place she covets on typical days but now is not a typical day. It's a disaster. It's judgment day, and she's not sure who's serving as judge, only that she hopes it isn't her)._

_A few words are all it takes to completely tip the scale, and Azula is out for blood. The movements are all too familiar, a deadly sequence that's been aimed at enemies more times than Ty Lee cares to remember. "But Mai isn't an enemy, Azula!" She wants to scream the words, but her body is faster than her voice. Her first jab meets a gap in the princess's armor; the second sends shockwaves of pain through her arm when it hits steel._

_Her own actions surprise her, and it's only when she takes in the sight of Azula prone on the ground that they truly sink in. _

_She's in a state of adrenaline now, her body and mind racing, trying to dull the pain and reality of what she's just done and she thinks maybe if she and Mai can get away for a bit, Azula's temper will cool and she can forgive them (Azula, forgiving? The same voice is laughing at the persistence of her optimism), but Mai is just as dumbstruck by her actions as any of them and refuses to move even at her urging, even as the guards surround them._

_They're both more than capable of freeing themselves from their current arrest, but when she see the absolute agony fight outrage for dominance in the princess's golden eyes, she can't bring herself to try. Running, she thinks, would only cause more cracks in the broken girl._

Her thumb brushed the dent again and suddenly her stomach dropped even more as she remembered the argument only moments before_. __**"What exactly have I ever done to hurt 'Zula?"**_

The answer was a lead weight in her chest. She'd done everything Ursa had and more. Her knees went weak as more memories of the pain she'd caused her lover over the years ran rampant through her mind.

_The air smells of grass and trees and dirt here. Not the heavy smell of stone and fire that hung around the capitol, but light and free. It is paradise to the young acrobat and recent run away. Although, she admits to herself, it's also colder here than the capitol. Absently her eyes drift to the west. The glare of the falling sun obscures everything on the horizon, though she knows she wouldn't be able to see home even so. It's not home any more she reminds herself, but something keeps her from believing that._

_A shadow edges into her view of the blazing sun and her eyes follow it as it coasts closer. A bird, but it's not just any bird she realizes. It's a messenger hawk and by the way its harness gleams in the sun she knows it's a royal messenger hawk. Azula, the name drifts through her mind leaving an uncomfortable ache in her chest. She'd been so caught up in getting away from her family, she hadn't even thought about Azula. The affects running would have on others had barely crossed her mind, but as the hawk drew closer, circling over her before it came down to land, her thoughts move to the princess. When the bird lands and presents its carrier to her she's hesitant to open it, and her hands are slow to withdraw the scroll._

_The edges of the paper are scorched where the princess held it in heated hands and leave her finger tips smudged with soot or crumble away as the paper is unrolled. The princess's flawless calligraphy is shaky and smudged, but legible. Only one word stands out on the page. Just one word, but Azula has never needed to make speeches to break people. As her eyes trace it over she feels her chest constrict and tears begin. In an instant she wants to go home more than anything in the world._

'_Why?'_

_That is all that's written. _

'Why?' The word had followed her, haunted her. _Why did you leave me? Why don't you love me? Why did you choose them? Why am I not good enough? _She'd seen those questions run through Azula's eyes a hundred times in as many ways, always accompanied with a longing sort of pain. A sort of pain that Ty Lee had always associated with the girl's mother and ignored when the princess turned it on her. She felt her blood as ice water in her veins.

"_**Was it me who called her a monster and made her hate herself?"**_ Perhaps she'd never said the word aloud but her actions had certainly spoken loudly enough for her. Every time she'd stepped into one of Azula's fights. Every time she'd taken the other person's side. Every time she'd blocked the dragon's bending. She may as well have screamed the word at the princess.

As her tears renewed she took a shaky step away from the armor stand, her knees giving as she moved and her hand pushing the metalwork away with more force than she'd counted on. The stand toppled forward to fall to the ground beside her.

When she looked, the weak spot in the back plate had grown into a spider's web of cracks.

One small dent ruining the master piece of armor.

"_**I've never hurt her." **_


End file.
